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In 2001, Agip Oil Ecuador BV, a subsidiary of the multibillion dollar Italian petrochemical company Eni, convinced an association of Huarani Indians to sign over oil access to tribal lands and give up their future right to sue for environmental damage. In return Agip gave, among other things, modest allotments of medicine and food, a $3,500 school house, plates and cups, an Ecuadorian flag, two soccer balls and a referee's whistle.

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The history of oil development in the Amazon region is one of vast ecological destruction, loss of livelihood and cultural identity by indigenous groups, and conflict between multinationals and indigenous peoples. More often than not, the state has been absent from these conflicts, other than facilitating oil company entrance through concession contracts, and its growing dependence on oil revenues. When indigenous people have asserted their rights, government reaction has ranged from turning a deaf ear to military intervention, leaving oil companies free to impose terms on the communities whose land they enter. Now it has come to light that the Amazon region has been more formally militarized, at the request of the oil companies, through secret contracts signed between oil company representatives and the Ministry of Defense.

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See also AlterNet's follow-up to the Kelly Hearn article.

For a bit of background on oil imperialism in Ecuador, see this excerpt from Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, by John Perkins:

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For every $100 of crude taken out of the Ecuadorian rain forests, the oil companies receive $75. Of the remaining $25, three-quarters must go to paying off the foreign debt. Most of the remainder covers military and other government expenses - which leaves about $2.50 for health, education, and programs aimed at helping the poor. Thus, out of every $100 worth of oil torn from the Amazon, less than $3 goes to the people who need the money most, those whose lives have been so adversely impacted by the dams, the drilling, and the pipelines, and who are dying from lack of edible food and potable water.

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Thanks in good measure to oil, Ecuador is today one of the world's most corrupt and stratified countries with one of the weakest political structures. Oil income has encouraged corruption, patronage and concentration of wealth. And it has also shielded governments from more accountable decision-making and necessary democratic reforms.

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
Those articles are truly appalling.

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Power to the people. And picture this, friends "[]"(make a square with your thmbs and fingers and look through the frame it makes) Imagine everything around you is free and freely accessable for everyone who isn't greedy.

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Originally posted by Cougyr:

Yes, as are the ones you posted. Thanks. These talk about Equador, but the oil companies do their dirty work everywhere. One would expect oil to bring riches to the people who occupy the land, Nothing could be further from the truth. The reality in most places is that the people would be better off without oil, or any other resource needed by the industralized world.

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Truer words were never spoken. It's always interested me that those countries that depend upon resource export are amongst the poorst countries in the world, even if their export is oil, the most valuable commodity in an industrial economy.

Canada is sort of unusual in that respect, but our industrial economic infrastructure pre-dated the discovery of oil in quantities necessary for export, so we were spared the worst of the problem.

However, as other nations overcome our own ability to produce manufactured goods, we will find ourselves increasingly dependent on resource extraction, and that can only turn out one way.

Part of the problem is we think we own the resources, but we don't. Almost all resources in this country are in private hands, and most often the profits leave the country.

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Originally posted by maestro:
. . . so the taxpayer is paying them to access their own profits.

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GM and Ford could, theoretically compete with Toyota, but not with Japan. Private enterprise, trickle-down economics and free market glitz at least sounded good all those years though.

Brazil and South America were supposed to be the jewels up for grabs in this hemisphere during the cold war. So far the IMF has managed to enslave those countries with corrupted loans and dollarization of their economies after experiments in laissez-faire capitalism flopped in almost as grand a fashion in Chile and Argentina as it did in 1929.

[ 25 January 2006: Message edited by: Fidel ]