BP AND OIL EXPLORATION

Espacio are working closely with Colombian social organisations in the region of Casanare, where BP have been extracting oil and gas since the early 1990’s.

BP’s presence in the region created a humanitarian and ecological crisis, which continues to the present day.

In 2007-2008, two Espacio members spent a year working on a research project documenting the impact of BP's activities with COS-PACC, a social organisation that was set up by displaced farmers from Casanare. The project is due to be published as a book in 2009, which will provide a resource for community organisations in the region.

Several members of Espacio have been involved in accompanying COS-PACC's human rights and community work in Casanare, as well as in helping run workshops informing people about another joint project, the Pen-Pal Protection Plan.

Background:

In the late 1990’s, B.P. was exposed by in the British media for complicity in human rights abuses. The company had contracted the 16th Brigade of the Colombian army to protect its oilfields, despite the Brigade’s dire human rights record, which includes murder, “disappearances”, torture, rape and the forced displacement of communities. B.P. also admitted to having employed the private security company Defence Systems Limited to provide counter-insurgency training to Colombian police and army units charged with the protection of B.P’s installations. This training was described as “lethal” by a DSL employee and included the surveillance and intimidation of peasant leaders who were mounting protests against BP’s ecological damage, denial of labour rights and lack of social investment.

Although BP claims to have changed its practices, the rural communities continue to report murders by the army as well as ongoing environmental damage and poor treatment of the local workforce.

On 16 March 2007, sixteen-year-old Roque Torres and his father Daniel were tortured and killed by the Colombian army. Daniel and Roque were just two of hundreds of peasant farmers from the oil-rich region of Casanare, Colombia, who have been murdered or “disappeared” at the hands of the army or state-linked paramilitaries in the context of B.P.’s oil-extraction activities in the region.

In response to this, groups in the Red de Hermandad, including Espacio and COSPACC - a Colombian organisation set up by displaced community leaders from Casanare – organised a delegation to Casanare in the summer of 2007.

Colombian organizations are demanding popular sovereignty over energy resources, creating the space to a move for alternatives to hydrocarbon-based fuels. This focus on sovereignty is important not only for dealing with the social impact of multinationals but also because the profit motive runs contrary to the need to take action on climate change. For example, whilst B.P. brands itself as “beyond petroleum” the company has a “reserve replacement rate” of 113%[1], i.e. they are increasing the amount of oil they produce through new discoveries. If this continues B.P. will not reduced its carbon emission, irrespective of it’s spending on alternative technologies. B.P. itself admits that the oil and gas it extracts emit around 570 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year, roughly equivalent to the carbon dioxide emission of the entire United Kingdom[2].

More information and resources:

• Report from the 2007 delegation to Casanare (a good introduction to the situation there) in English and Spanish.
  
• Personal account of the delegation from Espacio members. On Indymedia.
  
• Declaration from the People’s Permanent Tribunal hearing into the responsibility of the oil companies BP, Repsol and Occidental Petroleum for crimes against humanity in Colombia. In English and Spanish.
  
• Declaration from a preliminary hearing for the above, held in Glasgow in June 2007. In English.
  
• Article by COSPACC on the situation in Casanare. In English and Spanish.

Additional resources in Spanish

Alas we don’t have the resources to translate everything but here are some documents in Spanish (if anyone wants to join our team of volunteer translators please get in touch).

• Declaration from People’s Permanent Tribunal preliminary-hearing on natural resources, life and territory in Catatumbo, Colombia, May 2007
  
• Declaration from a preliminary hearing into Respol’s activities in Colombia and the world, held in Madrid, June 2007.

What you can do:

“Twin” with a threatened Colombian in Casanare through the Pen Pal Protection Plan that Espacio are running with the Colombia organization COS-PACC

If you speak Spanish, there is also the possibility of working in Colombia as a volunteer providing international accompaniment to social organisations.