Actor Danny Glover to Visit Contaminated Areas in the Ecuadorian Rainforest Where Chevron Operated
Quito, Ecuador (PRWEB) November 04, 2013 -- The famous American actor and social activist Danny Glover arrived in Ecuador yesterday where he plans to visit an area of the Ecuadorian Amazon rainforest were the multinational oil giant Chevron operated, and was sentenced by a local court to pay a multibillion-dollar fine for a massive environmental contamination.
Ecuador’s vice president, Jorge Glass, announced Saturday that Mr. Glover will, “also submerge his hand in one of the toxic pits that Chevron left in the Ecuadorian Amazon rainforest”. The actor will visit the former oil field Aguarico 4 in the northeastern province of Sucumbios. Ecuadorian officials indicate that the field was operated exclusively by Texaco and abandoned in 1986 by the company. Chevron Acquired Texaco in 2001, along with all its liabilities.
Danny Glover has gained international recognition not only for his successful artistic career, but also for his wide-reaching social and humanitarian activism, both in the United States and around the world. Mr. Glover served as Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Development Program from 1998 to 2004, and is currently serving as UNICEF Ambassador.
Mr. Glover’s visit to Ecuador came in response to an invitation made by the National Secretariat of Communication of Ecuador to international public figures, activists, and reporters to show the world the scope of the environmental damage and the conditions that the affected villagers and farmers have endured for past three decades as a result of such damage.
The invitation stems from a campaign launched by President Rafael Correa last September in support of the communities that were affected by the contamination. Texaco, now Chevron, operated in Ecuador between 1964 and1990.
Mr. Glover’s participation in this campaign that seeks justice for the affected communities in Ecuador came just weeks after a visit of Gayle McLaughlin, the mayor of Richmond, California, whose city is involved in a legal battle with Chevron over a massive fire in a local Refinery that sent nearly 15 thousand people to local hospitals with respiratory problems (City of Richmond v. Chevron Corp. et al., case number 13-c-01654, in the Superior Court of the State of California, County of Contra Costa). Also, American singer and actress Cher recently posted a video in support of the affected communities and called for a boycott of Chevron products. Last October, human rights advocate, Bianca Jagger wrote an article on the Huffington Post denouncing Chevron’s legal tactics to avoid payment of the Ecuadorian ruling, and joined a group of Ecuadorians and environmentalists in a rally in front of the Second District Court in downtown New York, where Chevron brought the victims of the contamination and their lawyers to trial.
In February of 2011, the Superior Court of Nueva Loja, Ecuador, issued a judgment (Aguinda v. Chevron No. 2003-0002), ordering Chevron to pay $18.3 billion for environmental damages. Shortly before the final Ecuadorian ruling, Chevron filed a lawsuit in a federal court in New York against the Ecuadorians and their lawyers based on the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. The trial began in New York on October 15, before Judge Lewis Kaplan, who was accused by the plaintiffs of biased in favor of Chevron, through a petition for Writ of Mandamus filed at the U.S. Court of Appeals. (case 11-2259)
The case is Chevron Corp. v. Donziger et al., case number 2:11-cv-00691, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.
(MCSquared is a boutique public relations firm based in Brooklyn, which provides a broad platform of services, including, but not limited to, media monitoring, editorial and news content, executes conferences and media planning. The firm organizes political and business-oriented events.)
Jean-Paul Borja, MCSQUARED PR, http://www.mc2pr.com, +1 (212) 602-1730, [email protected]
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