HOTSPOTS
Volume 6, Number 9, November 30, 2001
BOUGAINVILLE: The US State Department has attempted to derail a lawsuit filed by Bougainvillean landowners against the mining giant RioTinto, which alleges genocide and environmental damage in operating the giant Panguna copper mine on the Papua New Guinea island. In an unprecedented move, the US State Department has written to the judge hearing the case saying that if the class action suit goes ahead, it would affect US relations with PNG. The PNG government is trying to block the lawsuit, saying it could derail the peace process on Bougainville. (Australian Broadcasting Corporation, November 30, 2001)
BURMA: Members of the US-based union the International Brotherhood of Teamsters are demanding that Amereda Hess, a US-based corporation drop its stake in UK-based Premier Oil. The Hess Teamsters, wearing stickers which read “Hess out of Burma,” argue the company is supporting brutal forced labour and the suppression of democracy in Burma through its stake in Premier. Around 300 Teamsters – the majority of whom are truckers in the northeast US and South Carolina – have joined in the protest by sending in “an appeal for justice” to Hess. The Brussels-based International Confederation of Free Trade (ICFTU) and its “Global Unions” partners released a list of 250 companies with business links to Burma. The ICFTU said the move could help convince companies to pull out of Burma, thereby pressuring the junta to comply with ILO standards which treat forced labour and slavery as crimes of international law. (ICFTU Press, November 15, 2001; Upstream, October 12, 2001)
CHINA: Eleven tonnes of the chemical sodium cyanide leaked into the Luohe River after a lorry transporting it to a local gold mine was involved in a road accident late October. Two dams were built across the river, about 75km (50 miles) upstream to contain the spill from spreading to the industrial city of Luoyang, and officials say so far they believe they have the situation under control. Some 500 tonnes of disinfectant are reported to have been poured into the tributary in an attempt to nullify the affects of the cyanide, yet this is still likely to have damaging consequences for the local environment. The Luo River is a branch of the Yellow River, the main waterway in northern China. Local media said the drivers of the truck fled after the crash without warning authorities and the local government learned of the spill only after receiving reports of dead cattle. (BBC, November 5, 2001; PlanetArk, November 7, 2001, https://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13166/story.htm )
NIGERIA: An oil pipeline owned by the Royal Dutch Shell exploded, killing as many as 15 people and injuring 14 others. The explosion occurred at Umidike in Imo State on November 5. Ironically, Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) in October, called for the introduction of a national environmental and safety standard in the Nigerian oil and gas industry that meets international standards. Meanwhile the Nigerian government has set up a special committee to ensure total security for oil producing areas, noting that the siege on the oil producing areas by ‘restive youths, communal agitators and economic saboteurs’ must end. This signals an alarming increase in militarization against communities who are impacted severely by oil exploitation in the Niger Delta. Chief Ekaette explained that the recent ‘terrorism’ had made the assured security of oil installations an urgent imperative. Felix Ekure, Delta State chairman of the National Youth Council of Nigeria (NYCN), has warned that unless the youths of the Niger Delta are carried along in the development of the region, the country may know no peace. (Reuters, November 15, 2001; Financial Standard (Lagos), November 12, 2001; Vanguard (Lagos). November 9, 2001; Africa News Service, October 15, 2001)
PAPUA NEW GUINEA: Communities affected by the Ok Tedi mine owned by BHP Billiton blockaded and shut down the mine on November 25 costing the company close to US$1 million. Representative from the 4 communities living near the mine presented a petition demanding compensation and a share of BHP Billiton’s 52 per cent stake in Ok Tedi to be transferred to them and for compensation of environmental damage since the mine was opened in 1981. The PNG government last month refused a request from local landowners to grant them 12 per cent of the benefits from the Program Trust Company, where BHP Billiton’s interest in the mine will be transferred when the company quits the mine early next year. (AAP Information Services Pty. Ltd, November 26, 2001)
PHILIPPINES: President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has denied a 30-billion-peso nickel mining project in Mindoro, by Crew Development citing environmental concerns. Environment Secretary Heherson Alvarez said the President concurred with the Department of Environment and Natural Resource’s (DENR) assessment that the mining operations of the Canada-based Crew Development Corp. would inflict “irreparable damage to the environment. The President sustained our observation that the Aglubang mining project of Crew transcends the threshold of sustainable development because of technical and social evidence,” Alvarez told reporters. According to Catherine Coumans of MiningWatch Canada, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources in July cancelled a permit given to the mine by the previous administration, a first in the Philippines. The company appealed to the office of the President with a lot of support from the Canadian Ambassador and threatened a lawsuit against the government if their permit was not returned. (Inquirer New Service, November 1, 2001; pers. Comm. Catherine Coumans)
UNITED STATES
Alaska: A 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled earlier this month that the US$5 billion fine, ordered by a U.S. District Court jury in 1994 at the close of a summer-long civil trial against ExxonMobil, was excessive. The ruling stunned and angered Alaskans who had sued ExxonMobil for punitive damages from the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill. About 40,000 fishermen, Native communities, property owners, and others were affected by 10.8 million gallons (40.9 million liters) of oil spilled by athe Valdez owned by Exxon. Many plaintiffs were counting on payments from the punitive verdict to help heal various problems, including a deteriorating fishing economy. A six-year study conducted by the Prince William Sound Science Center an Alaska-based nonprofit, reopened the question of a link between the spill and an unprecedented herring population crash in 1993, historic lows today and the 11 million gallons of oil the Exxon Valdez dumped 12 years ago. The study was a part of a US$3 million federally funded project to assess the health of herring populations in Prince William Sound. (Anchorage Daily News, November 16, 2001; Reuters, November 8, 2001)
California: Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton announced that her Department will rewrite a legal opinion made by former Interior Secretary Babbitt who denied the highly controversial Imperial Project gold mine in Imperial County California to protect archaeological, religious and cultural resources sacred to the Quechan Tribe and other Colorado River peoples. According to Roger Flynn, a lawyer for the Western Mining Action Project, the motion does not approve the mine, but it will allow the BLM under Norton’s leadership to reconsider it. “Today’s [October 25, 2001] announcement is an affront to all American Indians. It indicates the direction this Department may be headed in implementing executive orders and handling trust assets so important to Indian peoples. They appear destined to break another promise – their promise to protect this sacred area from certain destruction. This is an outrage,” stated Mike Jackson, Sr., President of the Quechan Tribal Council. (Pers. Comm. Roger Flynn, Western Mining Action Project, November 30, 2001; Press Release, Quechan Tribal Council, et al, October 25, 2001)
WISCONSIN: Communities and environmental organizations have cleared a major hurdle in the campaign to ban the use of cyanide in the US state of Wisconsin. The Wisconsin Senate voted 19 -14 to ban cyanide use in all Wisconsin mines and to have “No Special Treatment” for the mining industry. The bills now go to the State Assembly for consideration. Two other environmental bills cleared the Senate further strengthening regulation against the mining industry. One would bring up state groundwater and hazardous waste standards to the level of other industries, and end environmental exemptions for metallic mines. For background on the cyanide bill go to: https://www.alphacdc.com/treaty/cyanide.html (Pers. Comm. Zoltan Grossman, Wisconsin Campaign to Ban Cyanide in Mining and the Midwest Treaty Network, November 6, 2001)
HOW OIL INTERESTS PLAY OUT IN US BOMBING OF AFGHANISTAN
Volume 6, Number 8, October 31, 2001
We have synthesized a number of current analyses into some key facts about how oil ties into the US government’s long time involvement in Central Asia and its hopes of accessing the oil and gas riches of the area. Oil is clearly not the only force operating, and this is not a comprehensive analysis, but it is an important piece of a complicated political and economic struggle.
The United States has yet to provide concrete evidence that Osama bin Laden was behind the attacks, but has pursued a bombing campaign anyway against the Taliban and bin Laden with millions of innocent Afghanis caught in the middle. Some analysts are projecting a post-war Afghanistan where the US military is used as “pipeline police.” Following are some key points in how US oil interests play into the current so-called “war on terrorism.”
CENTRAL ASIA includes Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan, parts of India and China. For a map of the area go to: https://www.askasia.org/image/maps/cntasia1.htm
THE CASPIAN BASIN includes the Caspian Sea and surrounding countries, Azerbaijan, Iran, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Turkey and Georgia. For a map of the area go to: https://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/caspgrph.html
THE PERSIAN/ARABIAN GULF STATES include Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Kuwait, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Oman. For a map of the area go to: https://gulf2000.columbia.edu/reference/gulfregion.html
The Central Asian Republics and the Caspian Basin are Staggeringly Resource Wealthy:
The Caspian Basin has an estimated US$5 trillion of oil and gas resources. (1)
Central Asia has enormous quantities of undeveloped oil resources including 6.6 trillion cubic meters of natural gas and 10 billion barrels of undeveloped oil reserves. (2)
Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan are the two major gas producers in Central Asia. Turkmenistan contains the world’s eighth largest natural gas reserves. (3)
The United States is Resource Poor and the Largest Consumer of Oil:
The United States has only 3% of the world’s known oil reserves. (4)
Imports accounts for 60% of America’s daily oil consumption, 13% of that comes from Persian/Arabian Gulf States which produce 18% of the world’s supply of oil.
With less than 5% of the world’s population, the US accounts for over 25% of the world’s oil consumption (5).
The United States would like to control Caspian Sea and Central Asian oil in order reduce dependency on oil from the Persian/Arabian Gulf, which it cannot control.
Pipeline Routes are Key to Accessing Oil and Gas Wealth from the Caspian Basin:
“Those who control the oil routes out of Central Asia will impact all future direction and quantities of flow and the distribution of revenues from new production,” said energy expert James Dorian in Oil & Gas Journal on September 10, 2001.
The only existing export routes from the Caspian Basin lead through Russia. Investors in Caspian oil and gas are interested in building alternative pipelines to Turkey, Europe and Asia (6). Afghanistan occupies a strategic position between the Middle East, Central Asia and the Indian Subcontinent and lies squarely between Turkmenistan and the lucrative, desirable and growing markets of India, China and Japan.
U.S. oil companies have been negotiating with the post-Soviet republics of Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan for access to the Caspian Basin for years, but have made no progress because of the political instability in the region (7). The United States, Russia and US oil companies are currently struggling with each other to lay down pipeline routes that leverage control of the flow of oil and favor political and profit interests.
“Afghanistan’s significance from an energy standpoint stems from its geographic position as a potential transit route for oil and natural gas exports from Central Asia to the Arabian Sea. This potential includes proposed multi-billion dollar oil and gas export pipelines through Afghanistan…” said a US government Energy Information fact sheet in September 2000.
In 1996, a Unocal-led consortium won a contract to build a 1,005 mile oil pipeline and a companion 918-mile natural gas-pipeline, in addition to a tanker-loading terminal in Pakistan’s Arabian Sea port of Gwadan. Annual projected income of the project was US2$ billion which in five years would have paid for its costs. The US government and the Unocal consortium feared that they could not build a pipeline as long as Afghanistan, which had been battered by war since the Soviet withdrawal in 1989, was unstable. In 1998, Unocal shelved the project just after the US cruise missile strike against Bin Laden’s Afghan camps (8).
The Bush-Cheney Oiligarchy has Long Represented Oil Interests in the Caspian Region:
“Because of the instability in the Persian Gulf, Cheney and his fellow oilmen have zeroed in on the world’s other major source of oil – the Caspian Sea. Its rich oil and gas resources are estimated to be worth US$4 trillion by US News and World Report. The Washington-based American Petroleum Institute, voice of the major US oil companies, called the Caspian region, ‘the area of greatest resource potential outside of the Middle East,’ according to Marjorie Cohn, a professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law in the Chicago Tribune, August 2000.
Six US oil giants — Unocal, Total, Chevron, Pennzoil, Amoco and Exxon — have invested heavily in the massive oilfield potential in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The region’s untapped oil reserves are estimated to be worth up to $2,000 billion. (9)
The one serious drawback companies have faced is getting the supplies to the right market, the energy-hungry Asian Pacific economies. Afghanistan — the only Central Asian country with very little oil — is by far the best route to transport the oil to Asia.
Enron, the biggest contributor to the Bush-Cheney campaign of 2000, conducted the feasibility study for a US$2.5 billion trans-Caspian gas pipeline which is being built under a joint venture agreement signed in February 1999 between Turkmenistan, Bechtel and General Electric Capital Services.
In 1994, Cheney as CEO of Halliburton, a multi-billion oil and gas services company, helped to broker a deal between Chevron (now ChevronTexaco) and the state of Kazakhstan when he sat on the country’s Oil Advisory Board. (10)
On behalf of oil companies, an array of former cabinet members from the Bush Sr. administration have been actively involved in negotiations with Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan. They include former secretary of state James Baker, Brent Scowcroft, former national security advisor, John Sununu, former chief of staff and Dick Cheney, former secretary of defense and now Vice President. (11)
Everyone who has Oil and Gas Interests in Central Asia Needs Stability in Afghanistan:
As one Russian newspaper described it, “Russia’s worries are not hard to understand. They have to do with postwar arrangements in Afghanistan. Economic interests are paramount. urkmenistan and Uzbekistan need stability in Afghanistan so that they can transit their oil/gas independently.” Russia has completed talks with the Tajiks on how to share gas revenues after the war is over. They’re estimating it will take six years to achieve stability. (12)
SOURCES: 1. “The big game gets bigger Russia will gain wealth and influence if it controls Caspian Sea oil,” by Mortimer B. Zuckerman, U.S. News and World Report, May 10, 1994 2. “Oil, gas in FSU Central Asia, northwestern China,” by James P. Dorian, Oil & Gas Journal, September 10, 2001; 3. “The big game gets bigger Russia will gain wealth and influence if it controls Caspian Sea oil,” by Mortimer B. Zuckerman, U.S. News and World Report, May 10, 1994; 4. “Fears Again of Oil Supplies at Risk,” by Neela Banerjee, New York Times, October 14, 2001; 5. World Petroleum Consumption, 1990-1999, Energy Information Administration/International Energy Annual 1999; 6.ibid; 7.Oil Omissions, Bush Sr., Cheney Have Big Stakes in Saudi Status Quo, WorkingforChange.com, October 18, 2001; 8. ibif; 9. “Prospect of oil riches speeds the wheels of war,” by Barry O’Kelly, Sunday Business Post, Ireland, October 28, 2001; 10. Oil Omissions, Bush Sr., Cheney Have Big Stakes in Saudi Status Quo, WorkingforChange.com, October 18, 2001; 11. “Scramble for the Caspian; Big Oil Looks to Divvy Caspian Sea Oil Riches,” by Pratap Chaterjee, Multinational Monitor, September 1998; 12. “The God of Fossil Fuels,” by James Ridgeway, The Village Voice, October 16, 2001.
SHELL OIL SPILLS CONTINUE TO RAVAGE COMMUNITIES AND THE ENVIRONMENT IN NIGERIA
Volume 6, Number 7, August 31, 2001
Royal Dutch Shell continues to wreak havoc on communities and the environment throughout the Niger Delta with reports of oil spills and associated violence and repression near the oil company’s operations. As of August 21, community leaders from Gokana, Ogoniland reported that fires caused by ruptured pipelines owned and operated by Shell Oil have been burning for two months with no response from authorities.
“Agency reports yesterday [August 20, 2001] that the community faced being ravaged by ‘devastation of unimaginable proportion’ unless urgent steps were taken to put off the ‘scores of fires ignited by pipeline excavators,'” said The Guardian news agency in Lagos. Other news correspondents report that farmland has been lost to the fires.
In Bayelsa State, the Ijaw Youth Council (IYC) has called on Shell Petroleum Development Company, the Nigerian subsidiary of Shell Oil, to cease all operations at the Nun River flow station in response to the murder of a 22-year old Ijaw man by the mobile police.
“It all happened between the hours of 3pm and 4pm Thursday [August 9, 2001] when a team of 15 persons comprising of Shell, Dec Oil and Gas [the clamping contractor], 24 mobile policeman from the Bayelsa state police command and 10 youths from Oporoma community passed through Angiama Creek off River Nun to Akanbuo bush of Aguaobiri in Southern Ijaw Local government. Without the consent of the Aguobiri Community and Bayelsa State Ministry of Environment, for a spill that occurred in June/July 2001, the said team in their clamping process was seen by women returning from farm. On arrival home, these women reported what they saw in the bush to the community. The youths were then sent into the bush to stop work and bring the said team into the community for dialogue,” said Oko Maxwell, the chairman of the Ijaw Youth Council.
Maxwell went on to say that the youths were unarmed and peaceful but were attacked by the mobile police anyway. The IYC has condemned the killings and President Kimse Okoko said, “Yesterday it was Nigerian Agip Oil company, today it is Shell and tomorrow it will be the turn of another multinational if immediate steps are not taken to resist this.”
Environmental Rights Action based in Benin City, Nigeria reported on an explosion and oil spill in June at Shell’s Nkpoku/Rumuekpe oil facility in June. The fallout from the explosion and spill has polluted drinking water sources and swamp animals the Ogbodo community relies on for food.
“Our community, Ogbodo is the largest in the entire Isiokpo clan of Ikwerre. The spill occurred on June 26, 2001 and the effects have been devastating. Those of us at the bank of Miniamu River were engulfed with irritating odor and itching every morning. We no longer drink from the rivers. As an emergency measure, Shell supplied few liters of water to the 15 families that make up Ogbodo. Apart fro the one I saw with my eyes, everyone here complained that the water Shell supplied is dirty and smells. Many people simply threw theirs away. We are facing severe water scarcity now,” said Isiri Alison, a 33-year-old Youth leader from Ogbodo.
According to a local newspaper in Lagos called This Day, nearly 4,835 oil spills have been counted totaling almost 2.4 million barrels of crude oil. These numbers were formally documented by Ray Ekpu of the National Human Rights Commission. He concludes that the debilitating health hazards of oil exploration have compounded developmental problems in the Niger Delta and is calling for deliberate remediation measures, stressing that if urgent steps are not taken, the people of the Delta are in imminent danger because of constant devastation of their source of livelihood.
SOURCES: “Pipeline Fire Looms in Ogoni, Threaten Crude Oil Sale,” by Yakubu Lawal, The Guardian (Lagos); “Niger Delta Records 4,835 Oil Spills in 20 Years,” by John Lwori, August 3, 2001; “Shell Spill At Ogbodo,” by Patrick Naagbanton, Environmental Rights Action field report, July 11, 2001.
VITAL STATISTICS: Greasing The Machine: Bush, His Cabinet and their Oil Connections
Volume 6, Number 5, June 30, 2001
George W. Bush, President
With a mixed bag of business ventures in his background, Bush’s best move was to sell a small company he started in the 1970s called Bush Exploration/Arbusto to Spectrum 7, which was later acquired by Harken Energy. In return he received US$600,000 worth of stock, a US$120,000 contract per year and a lot of friends in the Texas oil scene. His presence helped Harken score contracts in the Middle East when the company’s management mentioned to the government of Bahrain that President Bush’s kid “is on our Board”. No doubt Bush’s background with Harken will help them in their current struggle against well-organized social movements in Costa Rica, trying to stop this company from offshore oil drilling and exploration. During Bush’s campaign for President, oil money gushed into his campaign coffers: US$2.8 billion from energy companies and another US$2.3 million from the auto sector. Enron alone donated more than a million dollars to the Republican National Committee. Bush owns stock in General Electric, BP, Duke Energy, ExxonMobil, Newmont Gold Mining Corporation, Pennzoil and Tom Brown, Inc.
Dick Cheney, Vice President
Whether or not Dick Cheney is calling all the shots in the new administration or just most of them he clearly brings oil interests to the White House. After serving as Secretary of Defense under George Bush Sr., Dick left “public service” and settled in Dallas, Texas to head up the world’s biggest oil-services company, Halliburton (market value US$18.2 billion). Since 1992, Halliburton has contributed US$1.6 billion to the campaigns of Washington-bound politicians. Cheney’s record as a Wyoming Congressman from 1978 to 1989 hints at what’s to come. He co-sponsored a measure to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling and voted against the Clean Water Act which required industries to release their toxic emission records. Cheney is a member of a group called COMPASS (Committee to Preserve American Security and Sovereignty).
Spencer Abraham, Secretary of Energy
Abraham lost his race for re-election as Senator in his home state of Michigan, but that didn’t disqualify him from the directing the Department of Energy whose mission is to “foster a secure and reliable energy system” for the US. Coming from Michigan, the state most identified with the car industry and home to “Motown” (aka Detroit) and to most major automobile manufacturers in the US. It is no wonder General Motors, Ford, DaimlerChrysler are on his list of campaign contributors from his days as an elected official. Given that this new Energy Secretary will be deciding on the thorny issue of fuel economy regulations, which have been the subject of a major environmental pressure campaign in order to reduce the number of gas-guzzling “Sport Utility Vehicles” (SUVs) on America’s roads. Abraham personally fought to limit fuel-efficiency in SUV’s, as well as to cut research into renewable energy and to wipe out the federal gasoline tax. The car industry should now be confident they have nothing to fear. His connections to Lear, the maker of private jets, probably also eschews any hope of taxing aviation gas in the United States in this term.
Gale Norton, Secretary of Interior
A former corporate lawyer and passionate believer in ‘free-market environmentalism’. She is a longtime supporter of wide-open drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska and in the Rocky Mountains. As Secretary of the Interior she will inform the President on issues of management of “public” or federally controlled land. When she was Attorney General of Colorado, British Petroleum and Ford were amongst her contributors. An example of her attitude toward Corporate Criminals was set when she settled a case with Robert Friedland, the mining magnate who caused the largest cyanide spill in Colorado history at the Summitville mine in 1992. The settlement was for a paltry sum despite the fact that the government has spent nearly US$200 million to date trying to reclaim it and will spend another 100 years trying to repair the damage. On her appointment, staffers at the Interior Department building to down pictures celebrating US national parks and replaced them with pictures of the Trapper Mining Company in Craig, Colorado and its reclamation, where grass was planted after mining operations were done. Other pictures mounted where of an oil derrick off the US coast somewhere. A third is of a dam with a US flag on top and another is of the Rosebud Mine in Montana.
Condaleeza Rice, National Security Adviser
Rice is so conservative, she puts Ronald Regan to a newer shame. Her doctrine is to support only US national interests, and not that of the “international community” which she considers to be a myth. She has deep ties to the oil industry and right-wing think tanks like the Hoover Institute who are happy to know she now has the ear of the Commander in Chief on foreign policy and security issues. She spent a decade on the Board of oil giant Chevron Corporation, a service that earned her the honor of having one of its supertankers named “Condaleeza”. Chevron is a big player in Nigeria where there is increasing US military involvement, including training of Nigerian military to police the oil fields and secure pipelines. Before her appointment as Security Advisor, she declared environmental and human rights organizations “The Enemy.”
Don Evans, Secretary of Commerce
One of Evan’s greatest qualifications for running this agency which is responsible for promoting job creation, economic growth and sustainable development is that he was George W. Bush’s campaign manager and chief fundraiser in three separate elections. Other than that he has been CEO and Chairman of a relatively lackluster oil company called Tom Brown Inc. with interests in the inner Western states of the US. Evans was also a Board member of Sharp Drilling, an oil industry contractor. As the Secretary of Commerce he will also be overseeing the National Oceans and Atmosphere Administration (NOAA), the lead agency for regulating US oceans and air. This will likely torpedo any worthwhile research, science or policy recommendations on the issue of climate change. And since 25 percent of America’s domestic oil and natural gas production comes from offshore drilling the industry must be glad to have a friend on the inside.
SOURCES: Project Underground and Wayne Ellwood of The New Internationalist, March 2001, Also published in a slightly different format in The New Internationalist, June 2001, www.newint.org; Special thanks to the Center for Responsive Politics and their great website www.opensecrets.org; “Give Alaska to the environmentalists: The Bush administration wants to open up public lands to the oil and gas industry,” by Jerry Taylor, The Financial Post, Canada, January 31, 2001.
BP LINKED TO OVERTHROW OF AZERBAIJAN GOVERNMENT
Volume 5, Number 6, April 17, 2000
A Turkish secret service intelligence report has revealed that the British oil giant BP was allegedly involved in backing a military coup that overthrew the democratically elected government of Azerbaijan in 1993. In testimony included in the report, a former intelligence officer accused BP of trading arms for oil in an effort to secure a better deal on oil concessions in the country.
The intelligence report, leaked to the Sunday Times of London, documents how BP, using bribes and a supply of military arms, systematically undermined the government of Azerbaijan, and perpetuated the overthrow of President Abulfaz Elchibey. The coup caused the death of 40 people, along with violence and repression of Azeri citizens.
“As a result of our intelligence efforts, it has been understood that two petrol giants, BP and Amoco, British and American respectively, which together form the AIOC [Azerbaijan International Oil Consortium], are behind the coup d’etat carried out against Elchibey in 1993,” said the report.
Azerbaijan won independence in 1991 after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the global oil industry quickly moved in. In 1993, in two extraordinary votes, the parliament elected former KGB chief Heydar Aliyev into Parliament and then made him Speaker of the House just after the current Speaker mysteriously resigned. This put Aliyev second in line to the presidency. At that point, the report alleges that, “middlemen” paid off government officials and arranged to supply the incoming government with military equipment and an “arms-for-oil” deal, all on behalf of BP. This allowed BP to consolidate its position in the country.
In June of that same year, military leader Colonial Surat Huseinov, with a coalition of forces, directed a column of soldiers, tanks and heavy equipment toward capital city Baku and forced President Elchibey to step down. On June 24, 1993, Aliyev took over as President and on October 3, he was officially “elected” president of Azerbaijan.
Between the coup and the election, police violently broke up demonstrations and detained protestors. At least 137 people were arrested for participating in “unsanctioned” demonstrations. Others were arrested for putting up posters, announcing demonstrations and distributing leaftlets.
Less than a year later, in September 1994, BP and Amoco – who have since merged – signed the “Contract of the Century,” a US$8 billion dollar deal awarding the companies oil drilling rights in Azerbaijan. Other companies such as US-based Unocal, the Russian state-owned oil company Lukoil, and SOCARI, an Azeri state-owned oil company, were granted slightly smaller stakes.
According to the Times, a former Turkish military intelligence officer named other major oil companies offering support for Azerbaijan’s war with Armenia. “Present in the meetings were representatives and what I understood to be senior members of BP, Exxon, Amoco, Mobil and the Turkish Petroleum Company. The topic was always oil rights and, on the insistence of the Azeris, supply of arms and mercenaries to Azerbaijan,” said the officer in the report. He specifically named Terry Adams, then a senior executive of BP.
BP has admitted that some oil company representatives discussed the supply of arms, but has denied BP’s involvement, asserting that, “It would be alien to BP’s culture.” However, the company was caught in 1996 supplying equipment to the Colombian military and was accused by the Colombian government of passing on intelligence information, including photos and video tapes of local people protesting oil activities, to the Colombian military. These local people were then arrested or kidnapped on the grounds that they were “subversives.”
In March of this year, BP, which merged with Amoco in 1998 into BP Amoco, invested US$1 billion in PetroChina, a subsidiary of the China National Petroleum Company (CNPC). CNPC has been linked to war crimes in Sudan and is looking to raise capital for the expansion of its oil operations in Tibet. BP Amoco is also attempting to merge with the Atlantic Richfield Company (ARCO) in a US$27 billion bid that will make it the second largest private oil corporation.
SOURCE: “BP Accused of Backing ‘Arms for Oil’ Coup”, The Sunday Times, London, March 26, 2000; “Scramble for The Caspian”, by Pratap Chatterjee, Multinational Monitor, September 1998; “Azerbaijan’s Struggle Toward Democracy”, by Audrey L. Alstadt, in “Conflict, Cleavage and Change in Central Asian and the Caucasus, (Democratization and Authoritarianism in Post-Communist Societies, No.4), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997; “Human Rights Watch World Report: 1994”, by Human Rights Watch, www.hrw.org; “Colombian Government Report Accuses BP of Involvement in Environmental & Human Rights Abuses”, Drillbits & Tailings, November 6, 1996.
INDIGENOUS PEOPLES OF BRAZIL PLAN CONVERGENCE ON ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION
Volume 5, Number 5, March 31, 2000
Nearly 2,000 indigenous peoples from all over Brazil are organizing a convergence on Santa Cruz da Cabralia in April 2000 to counter the governmentâs planned celebration of the “discovery” of Brazil. Caravans will leave from each part of the country and head toward Bahia on the east coast of Brazil where in 1549, Portuguese conquistador Pedro Alvar Cabral landed his ship in search of gold, slaves, and Christian converts.
Indigenous March 2000 will culminate in the Conference of Indigenous Peoples and Organizations in Coroa Vermelha, Bahia, where proposals for “another 500 years” will be presented. Organizers say more than 70,000 non-Indian protesters, many from Brazilâs radical landless movement, will join in. The march symbolizes indigenous resistance and the struggle for the rights historically denied to them. Numerous committees have been formed across Brazil under the banner of “Brazil: 500 Years of Indigenous, Black and Popular Resistance,” to mobilize the Brazilian public and reflect on the new forms of colonialism fed by the media.
In Brazil alone, the estimated native population was 5,000,000, belonging to 1,000 tribes, before Cabral arrived. By 1560, 11 years after he landed on the shores of Bahia, 40,000 indigenous peoples were enslaved and working on plantations. Today, according to Survival, a UK-based human rights organization, there are only 330,000 native peoples divided into about 210 tribes, largely because of centuries of disease, slavery, violence, starvation and suicide.
“Our people are still suffering, being murdered. Women are turning to prostitution because of the poverty. Now they are spending all of this money on a party. What are they commemorating?ä asked Jose Alberto Sivla, Makuxi tribal leader.
The counter-celebration follows a long line of indigenous struggles internationally which according to the American Indian Movement (AIM) saw an upsurge in the 1960s along with national liberation movements in Africa, Asia, and the Americas. This upsurge came from the continued struggles of Native peoples and the development of the struggle against continued resource extraction throughout the Americas.
The primary focus of these indigenous movements was to recuperate stolen lands, says AIM, leading to widespread land occupations, protests, and road blockades. In Chile, Mapuches began “fence-running” – moving fences separating indigenous reserve lands from farmlands and thereby extending the reserve territory. In Mexico, indigenous peasants carried out large-scale occupations. By 1975 there were 76 occupations in Sinaloa alone, and some 25,000 acres (62,000 hectares) of land were occupied in Sinaloa and Sonora. By December 1976, tens of thousands of peasants occupied land in Sonora, Sinaloa, Durango, and Coahuila. Of course, these occupations and protests along with many others did not occur without severe repression. Assassinations, massacres, destruction of communities, and scorched earth policies were directed against the indigenous movements.
For Indigenous March 2000, representatives from the Yanomami, Makuxi, Guarani, Matis, Marubo and many other tribes are coming together to reaffirm that the cultural diversity of indigenous peoples as the root of their resistance. They hope to strengthen solidarity and to defend constitutional rights, to build social movements, to broaden alliances with other movements, and to contribute to a livable world for everyone.
SOURCES: “Brazil Indians plan to crash party”, by Phil Stewart, Reuters, February 13, 2000; “Indigenous Peoples Reclaim Brazil; Indigenous Movement March 2000”, Rainforest Foundation US, March 2000; “Brazil to Celebrate Date that Meant Genocide for 5 million” Survival Press Release, March 1, 2000; “The Crucible of Ideology; Violence in the Americas and the Emergence of Human Rights and Racism”, by Carwil James, April 24, 1998; “500 Years of Indigenous Resistance”, the Oh-Toh-Kin, Vol. 1 No. 1, Winter/Spring 1992, The American Indian Movement, https://www.dickshovel.com/500.html.
