Short AMZN now

I've occasionally regretted not using Amazon. Not any longer. This from AP.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Amazon is selling a self-published book defending pedophiles, sparking discussions about the retailer's obligation to vet items before they are sold in its online stores.
The book, "The Pedophile's Guide to Love and Pleasure: a Child-lover's Code of Conduct" by Philip R. Greaves II, offers advice to pedophiles afraid of becoming the center of retaliation. It is an electronic book available for Amazon.com Inc.'s Kindle e-reader.
The book has triggered mounting outrage on Twitter and beyond. A chorus of Twitter users is calling for Amazon to pull the book, continues

Bezos cares about his PPS, so stick it to him where it really hurts. Short this stock, make some money, get him to change the AMZN screening policy NOW. And while you're at it, if you see Philip R. Greaves II in the street break his nose for us all, yeah?

UPDATE: 

What. The. Fuck?

Amazon sez: "Amazon believes it is censorship not to sell certain books simply because we or others believe their message is objectionable."

Look here Bezos you dickhead, pedophilia doesn't come under the subject heading "objectionable". It comes under "illegal", "repugnant", "utterly disgusting", "felonous", "criminal" and add your own to the list. This isn't some handwringing about rights of free speech, it's about stopping some of the worst and most depraved people on the face of the planet from promoting their message. Fuck you, Amazon.

A Death in Sion

What happens when oil companies move into the Amazon jungle.



The above video is not recommended viewing for any gringo in denial.

Amazon boat accident

News is filtering through of a nasty accident on the Peru stretch of the Amazon, close to the border with Colombia. A boat carrying around 150 people is reported sunk, going down at 2:15am local time this morning and most of the passengers are currently listed as missing. Two dead have been confirmed to now. There are reports of the sound of banging coming from inside the sunken craft, presumably from people trapped inside. No news yet on how many people managed to swim to the river bank but may still be officially missing.

UPDATE: Reports are still patchy, with unofficial word coming through that at least 80 people who were asleep on the boat when it went down are now safe, but there are still more than 100 unaccounted for and there's also talk of around 40 people trapped inside the sunken craft. Also (surprise surprise), the boat that is licensed to carry up to 170 people was probably carrying more than 250. That snippet will not come as a shock to anyone that has travelled The Amazon.

Peru: Gold miners in Madre de Dios

The front page, above fold, of El Comercio today
(click to enlarge)

An excellent piece of journalism in Peru's El Comercio today (a reminder of the newspaper that it used to be) bylined Nelly Luna, showing the ecological disaster area created in the Amazon jungle of Peru by informal gold mining. The Madre de Dios Region is home to an estimated 30,000 miners, nearly all of whom produce gold illegally and with no regard whatsoever to environmental regulations.

Main feature page of the El Comercio page today,
complete with photos of the disaster zone
(click to enlarge)

Here follows my translation of the full report, entitled "Brutal Deforestation of Madre De Dios", and watch out right at the end for a revealing interview with the Mining Ministry Flunkey, who knows what is happening, knows it's illegal and knows that around 50 metric tonnes of mercury legally imported into Peru ends up being illegally sold in the disaster area but doesn't want to do a thing to stop it. His arguments are laughable and clearly just wants to protect the status quo, not giving a damn about the enormous damage that current policies are causing. Viva investment grade.

Who will halt this criminal attack against nature?

Brutal Deforestation of Madre de Dios

Forests are converted into deserts due to the advance of informal mining that illegally extracts gold. Regular buying and selling of mercury is demanded by locals, who use it for the extraction of the precious metal.

An overflight of the jungle between Madre de Dios and Puno offers a panoramic portrait of the devastation; thousands of tonnes of earth removed and forests disappeared or buried beneath the tailings left by years of intense and illegal exploitation of gold in the Amazon. It is possible to make out improvised mining camps, heavy machinery turning over the red soil, flows of rivers cut off and enormous pools of water that hold an un-noticed poison that keeps on accumulating: mercury.

This element is as necessary in the exploitation of gold as kerosene is in the production of cocaine. Because of this, mining engineers and environmentalists argue that if the sale of mercury is regulated, in the same way as chemical supplies are to combat narcotrafficking, a large part of the problem of illegal mining and the destruction of the forests. But this doesn't happen; mercury is sold without any sort of control among the population that is found around the mining zones of Puno and Madre de Dios.

Supply and Demand
According to Customs information, in just the last four years the importation of mercury has nearly doubled, from 75,000kg imported in 2006 to 132,000kg last year. And so far this year, only up to September, there have been legal imports of 131,876kg of mercury. The Ministry of Energy and Mines (MEM) says that all these imports are basically used in artisanal mining, where levels of informality (no mining or land titles held or environmental impact studies approved) reach 90%.

For every gram of gold produced, two or three times as much mercury is needed. A recent study by Cáritas estimated that more than 50 tonnes of mercury is used in the Madre de Dios region per year- Despite the large scale of the mining exploitation, tax evasion due to the informality of the industry is enormous; this region receives only S/15,000 (U$5,200) in mining royalties from the state.

Up to March 2009, the Institute of Geology, Mining and Metallurgy (Ingemmet) and the MEM had authorized 1,592 mining concessions in Madre de Dios and only 19 have approved environmental impact studies, with another 1,089 in process. There are also 87 mining concessions that overlap the Peru State Nature Reserve of Tambopata. According the the MEM, the control of current illegal mining is the responsibility of the regional governments.

"The mining concessions have been authorized without taking into account other existing rights such as agricultural properties, forestry concessions, conservation concessions and protected areas" according to the diagnosis of the Ministry of the Environment. With this disorder of concessions and a lack of controls, mercury is feeding into waters, lands and even in fishes. In improvised stores located around the mining zones such as Huepetuhe or Inambari, where the taxman never appears, one kilo of mercury sells for between S/150 and S/180 (U$52 to U$63) in jars with the ticket names American Mercury or El Español.

No Clear Rules
National rules establish that all companies that use mercury must have mechanisms that allow for the recapture and re-use of mercury, but nothing more. There is no rule that regulates the adequate final disposal or the metal. Experts say that the ideal situation would be to take it to safe depositories overseas (Peru does not have any). Without clear rules, each year more and more tonnages of this dangerous element arrives to stay (or evaporate) in some part of the country.

It is worth mentioning that 83% of mercury imported by Peruvian companies comes from the United States or Spain. Mercantil SA, Triveño Mercury Corporation, JH Minerals, Aldo Orlando Torres Rojas and M&M Trading S.R.L. are the main importers. The quantities that arrive are mainly destined for the mining industry, with lesser percentages for the production of chlorine and dental curation work.

But mercury is not the only element used in illegal mining in the Puno and Madre de Dios regions. Every day, front load diggers arrive that cost half a million dollars apiece along with lorries, trucks, excavators and drags. The economic investment is very large, nothing to do with small mining. The Ministry of the Environment estimates that 50 truckloads of fuel arrives to the zone every day, 175,000 gallons of diesel and gas is used and approximately 1,500 litres of oil is spilled by the machinery and boats. Who will put a stop to this situation?

Interview with Víctor Vargas Vargas, Director General of Mining, MEM
"Prohibiting sales could generate contraband"

"If the commercialization of mercury is regulated, wouldn't it reduce illegal mining?

Mercury is freely traded. There are formal companies that import and sell it in a legal manner. If it were prohibited, it may generate contraband in this material.

Imports have nearly doubled in the last four years.

This is connected with the rise in price of gold, which causes a greater demand for mercury in the marketplace. What's more, 98% of informal mining activity in the country is dedicated to gold mining and the basic ingredient is mercury. What we would like is that the technical requirements of the recovery of this element are complied with.

Therefore, mercury that arrives legally to the country finishes as being sold to illegal mining.

Indeed. Anybody can buy mercury, just like they can buy gold. There are no restrictions. What is needed is to formalize these people and teach them to correctly handle this resource. Large mining companies do not use mercury, but cyanide. Mercury is only used in artisanal mining. However, there are mines that during the exploitation process obtain mercury as a byproduct, for example in Yanacocha, that is then exported.

Is there a regulation, as there is for cyanide, that locates the final destination that the mercury must have?

There is no rule about its control, but there is perhaps thought of creating one, without aggravating the already existing problems. Blocking its comemrcialization would stimulate a black market and a rise in the price of this material.

Hunt Oil in the Peruvian Amazon: Reuters picks up the story

We've mentioned it on this humble corner of cyberspace several times in the last week, inlcluding this post to kick it all off and this post about eyewitness Sam Mitchell's unbeatable and detailed observations. Abiding has been on the case, too. Now the real newspeople are on the story and getting the word heard further and wider. Here's the start of the Reuters report on Hunt Oil and Repsol, click through for the rest:

LIMA, Oct 27 (Reuters) - Tribes in Peru say they want U.S. energy company Hunt Oil to abandon an exploration project in a virgin corner of the Amazon rainforest, and they have filed legal challenges against the government and the company to force it out.

Representatives of the tribes said on Tuesday they would sit down for talks with officials representing Hunt. Earlier this week, the tribes threatened to forcibly remove oil workers from a camp near the town of Salvacion in the Madre de Dios region of southern Peru.

"There is going to be a dialogue. We have to wait for the result of this meeting before we know about the removal," said Maria Gonzalez of the Fenamad indigenous rights group.

The tribes say a government concession to Hunt and Spain's Repsol (REP.MC) to look for oil in Block 76 is unlawful because it overlaps the Amarakaeri Communal Reserve, protected ancestral lands that could hold billions of dollars of oil deposits.

As the complaints wind their through the courts, the government of President Alan Garcia contends that the tribes control only surface rights of the reserve, while the government can lease subsoil mineral rights to foreign companies.

Tribes, frustrated by the slow pace of court cases and the government's stance, say Peru's position ignores their rights to autonomy and self-determination under the U.N. charter on indigenous peoples.

Hunt Oil declined requests for an interview about CONTINUES HERE

Serendipity: A new movie about the Peru that Hunt Oil wishes to exploit

It's a happy coincidence when a blog I admire such as Abiding in Bolivia comes out with information that dovetails perfectly with today's story on the misdeeds of Hunt Oil (and Repsol) in the southern Amazon Basin region of Peru.

Go over to Abiding on this link and check out a new feature film that's been made by the indigenous of the region. Made by the people who have so little chance of getting their own voices heard, I hope it becomes a monster hit and brings the other side of the conversation out to a wider audience. You can link through and see the whole thing from Abiding's post.

Excellent stuff.

IKN, now available on Amazon Kindle™

Jeesh, that Bezos dude must be getting desperate to drum up some business. News from the world of the interwebnetpipes is that this humble corner of cyberspace is now available to read via Amazon Kindle™. Lord only knows why you should want to fork out a buck ninety-nine (is that for a week?...a month? I have no idea) to read something that you can get for free anyway, but some focus group or another must have thought it a great idea at some point.

So anyway, if you have one of those funny plastic book walkaround thingies and really want to get IKN delivered to it, here's the link to click through. No swear words on the customer review section, please.

Bagua: International Extremist Terrorist Spotted in Peruvian Amazon

My stars, the Peru government was right all along. There are extreme left-wing foreign agent provocateurs infiltrating their lands and causing uprising amongst those little brown people after all. El Comercio reports that Interpol listed commiepinko gunrunner subversive OLIVIA NEWTON-JOHN was spotted attending the Shipibo People's conference in Ucayali, Amazonia this weekend. The good news for locals is that she voiced support for their cause and was named "cultural ambassador" by her indigenous hosts by way of honour.

The bad news for the locals was she sang a song.

Twobreakfasts approval rating drops 9 points to 21%

The thing about populations is that they've consistently proven themselves to be much smarter than either politicians or media outlets give them credit. Today's opinion poll published by IPSOS Apoyo is the regular monthly roundup of approval ratings in Peru, but is also the first one to be published since the Bagua massacre. Here are some of the choicer details, but you should click through and look for yourself; there's a lot of info and even basic Spanish should see you through (numbers are numbers, y'see);

• Twobreakfasts' approval rating drops 9% to stand at 21%
• His disapproval rating rises 15% to stand at 78%

• Prime Minister Yehude Simon's approval rating drops 10% to stand at 25%
• His disapproval rating rises 17% to stand at 61%

• Finance Minister Luis Carranza's approval rating drops 7% to stand at 19%
• His disapproval rating rises 9% to stand at 60%

Also, 63% of those polled said Yehude Simon sould resign, and a full 73% said Interior Minister Mercedes "nothing to do with me" Cabanillas should also resign. As for "who's to blame" for the Bagua massacre, here's how the percentages line up (more than one answer sometimes given)

• Twobreakfasts 57%
• Cabanillas 39%
• Simon 24%
• Alberto Pizango 17%
• National Police 17%
• Extremist Infiltrators 11%
• Foreign Infiltrators 11%
• Native Communities 7%
• NGOs 5%
• other/no answer 6%

So much for Evo Morales getting the blame, eh? As my personal favourite stat, 92% of Peruvians think that Amazon natives should be been consulted before the "law of the jungle" decrees (DL1064, DL1090) were passed. It makes the Peruvian embassy's argument last week look as stupid as it is and shows that Peruvians aren't going to settle for anything less than democracy.

All in all, it's good to note that the people of Peru weren't led up the garden path by the heinous propaganda spewed by Twobreakfasts and his lapdog press corps this month. The country of Peru really does deserve far better leaders than the dross it has to put up with.

Bagua: A must read must see photo reportage

Go to this link to see a photo-reportage of the Bagua massacre put together by two Belgian photographers who eyewitnessed the mayhem. Survival International has arranged the photos in a timeline form with comments by the journalists to accompany each one. Excellent job of work and a must-read on the subject. Here's the link again, just in case.

Hat tip to TO for picking up on this so quickly.

Peru's paranoid revisionism

Today's Spanish lesson: Rechazo = Rejection
(further translation, if needed, available on request)

Unsurprisingly, the world didn't suddenly go Pachakuti on us with the Twobreakfasts mea culpa on Wednesday evening. Just when you think the government of Peru might have learned something about its own people (e.g. can't treat them like slaves any more, can't rob them blind like they could 30 years ago, can't feed them BS propaganda in 21st century) we get the Peruvian Ambassador to the USA coming up with a revisionist history of the Amazonian conflict. And before we look at the crap presented as facts yesterday, it's worth noting that the Peru-US wig right now is none other that failed FinMin Luis Valdivieso, a man who has lived in every other part of the world except Peru for his whole adult life, except for the reent 10 month stint when he was called back to play at FinMin and was about as effective as a chocolate fireguard. Honestly, if you've walked the Inca Trail you'll know more about the issues in question than that guy, birth certificate 'made in Peru' or not.

So on to yesterday's presentation, which you can download and enjoy for yourself (gotta like reading fiction, though) right here. If you move to the paydirt page (slide 26 of 29), you'll read the following (in bold). A few Ottocomments come in between:

We acknowledge that the DL 1090 was not consulted with the principals of the native communities because it was believed that it was not against but in favor of them.

Oh those silly brown people! They just couldn't see that we're only trying to help them! Somehow they managed to misconstrue that by taking away their rights of consultation and approval on any project earmarked for their region they would be in a stronger position, not a weaker one! They didn't realize that by refusing to grant land ownership to the peoples, towns and communites that had applied for and done all the necessary paperwork years and years ago, and then claiming that land as "common ground" and selling it in underhand deals to oil companies, that this isn't like all the other times they'd been robbed of their natural resources in the last 500 years, this time really is different, folks................

It is now clear that the interlocutors for the dialogue were not representative and had a hidden political agenda not consistent with the concerns of the native communities.

WTF? There is no "hidden agenda". From the very moment the presidential decree was pushed through under emergency laws (that came to be simply to appease the US FTA) the indigenous communities affected by DL1090 protested. The protests started in July 2008 and only captured headlines when people got killed, but the protest was always representative of everyone in the region. This is total crap.

There was widespread and concerted misinformation and political interference both domestic (from the nationalist party) and external (particularly from President E. Morales and some ministers from Bolivia and Venezuela) who called for radical measures to destroy the Peruvian development model for the Amazon, to weaken the democracy, and ultimately to bring down the government

Hey guys, I got a great idea! When in trouble, blame Hugo and say it's all Evo's fault. What they saying here, that Evo has more influence over Peruvian affairs than its own President? That in itself is telling testimony of the changes going on in South America, but the fact is that neither Bolivia nor Venezuela interfered in the protests. No financial aid, no food handouts, no nothing. Of course both Venezuela and Bolivia made supportive noises about the Amazonia protest, but then again so did Belgium. And Norway. And Chile, for that matter. But let's not confuse things, eh? Just blame the axis of Evo for all your troubles and retreat into paranoia.

There was also a miscalculation in believing that there were only natives protesting and not criminal elements ready to create chaos and ignite an armed confrontation.

Incredible. "And we would have gotten away with it too, if it weren't for you pesky kids and that dog." Y'see, because WE decide that the protest is illegal and the la (which is now illegal in itself) was just, anyone opposing that must be A CRIMINAL! And we just didnt think the brown people would kick up a fuss.....goddam cottonpickin' miscalculations.

Bagua: Peru's Amazon laws officially scrapped

YAY!

Here's Reuters with the details:

LIMA, June 18 (Reuters) - Peru's Congress overturned two controversial land laws on Thursday that ignited deadly clashes between police and indigenous protesters in the Amazon rainforest two weeks ago, killing at least 34 people.

The vote to throw out legislative decrees 1090 and 1064 could delay foreign investment in mining and energy projects in the rain forest, and may prompt Peru and the United States to reevaluate clauses of their free-trade pact. [ID:nN06294730]

President Alan Garcia issued a series of decrees last year under powers Congress gave him to implement the U.S. trade deal and create a framework to regulate investment in the Amazon.

But after deadly violence, he backtracked and asked Congress to overturn two of the most divisive laws, although others remain in effect.

"This is a historic day for all indigenous people in Peru," Daysi Zapata, director of the Indian rights group Aidesep, said alongside dozens of indigenous people who yada yada continues here

Twobreakfasts comes clean

When Twobreakfasts was just Onebreakfast. The other
dude is Haya de la Torre (for those who know their history)

Gustavo Gorriti is a multiaward-winning journalist in Peru (look up his resumé if you're interested but suffice to say he's one of the most respected around). He came out with a phrase just before the run-off for 2006 presidential election between Twobreakfasts and Ollanta Humala (that Twobreakfasts won, of course). He wasn't proactively calling for people to vote for Alan (better) over Humala (worse) but pointing out Alan was "the least bad" of the two choices. Anyway, this is what he said.

"Alan García could not be a dictator even if he wanted; Ollanta Humala could not be a democrat even if he tried."

That phrase leaped from the recesses of memory last night when at 10pm Twobreakfasts addressed the nation from the presidential palace on TV. No need to do the whole script here, as the essence of the address was García admitting he'd made serious errors in the process that led up to the Bagua massacre and then the errors continued during and afterwards (his exact phrase was "a succession of errors and exaggerations"). He couldn't let the opportunity pass without laying some of the blame on "agitators and politicos" but hey...time to cut the guy some slack.

My view that the guy is an awful president at the head of an even worse administration hasn't changed. For sure his TV address last night was a political calculation, too. But I do salute him for having enough integrity to admit he screwed up live on TV. He did the right thing. It took weeks (nay months) and the blood of 23 police officers and a still-unknown numbers of protestor deaths, but he did do the right thing.

However the loudest cheer is left for the people that stood up to him. All the pressure levied on the guy in the last few days, both from inside and outside Peru, has brought this change from Twobreakfasts be in no doubt. When APRA cranked up the bullyboy tactics via their hideous and overtly racist TV propaganda, right-thinking people pushed right back at him. García would not have changed his tune last night if it weren't for the weight of public opinion. We will now get the annulment of the anti-Amazon, pro-oil company laws that he tried to push through as executive decrees. We will get the resignation of a woefully disappointing Prime Minister in Yehude Simon. And we might even get a Peruvian president that has learned a significant lesson and won't try to ride roughshod over his people again...though looking at track records that may be way too much to ask.

The thing that's on my mind now is "who'll be the next PM?". PPK is probably favourite right now, but upgrades from within the cabinet (Mercedes Araoz, José Chang) are possible too. Another one that came to mind is getting Lourdes Flores, leader of UN, to come in and put an official seal on the right-wing nature of Twobreakfasts version 20.09. We shall wait and we shall see.

Bagua: Peru's government eats crow..YAY

Yehude Simon at today's meeting

Peru's PM Yehude Simon met today with representatives of the Amazon indigenous peoples and, not to put too fine a point on it, told them what they wanted to hear:

• Regarding the infamous Presidential decrees 1064 and 1090 (the so-called 'law of the jungle' that would have allowed the gov't to sell Amazonian land to private companies without consulting locals). Simon said the government would present to Congress a project to overturn and annul the laws.

• The government would lift the State of Emergency decree in the Amazon region.

• A working consultancy group including all people affected would be set up immediately.

• Simon apologized to the indigenous "if they had felt threatened by any action taken by the government."

• At the end of the four hour meeting, the indigenous representatives applauded Simon after his closing remarks.

Look, so far it's word and not deeds, and simply because the executive presents a plan to annul a law it doesn't mean that Congress will go through with the plan, but let's give Simon and the Peru gov't the benefit of the doubt for the moment and regard today as a big step towards a resolution and an enormous climbdown on the part of the Twobreakfasts government. As Churchill said, jaw jaw is better than war war.....a thousand times better, in fact. Here's how Peru state news agency Andina reported the meeting (first couple of paragraphs translated, find the rest here):

The executive subscribed this afternoon to a 12-point act of understanding with native communities of the central jungle, in which it committed to present before Congress before June 18th a proposal to overturn the legaslative decress 1090 and 1064.

After a four hour meeting between Simon and the "Apus" of 390 indigenous communities in the town of San Ramón, they also agreed that the other questioned decrees should be discussed in the National Coordination Group for the Development of Amazonian Peoples that will begin tomorrow.

To begin this Group, representatives will travel to Lima from the central jungle region to join a multisectoral working commission, guaranteeing the participation of AIDESEP and other native groups.

Continues here

A decent English Language report on the indigenous oil conflict

The Achuar of Peru. In 2005 Peru's health ministry found that 98% of Achuar living downstream from oil production camps had dangerously high levels of cadmium in their bloodstreams. Those living upstream from oil wells had normal levels. Sheer coincidence, y'know.

So there I was a couple of days ago lamenting that all MSM and newswires only tell the corporate government spin side of the story and miss out the indigenous viewpoint in the ongoing conflict over land and rights in the Amazon Basin. I'm now glad to eat my words and feature this Reuters report that just about hits the nail on the head on the issue. Well worth reading, so here it is.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Peru's Garcia tussles with tribes over land rights

Thu May 21, 2009 3:43pm EDT

LIMA, May 21 (Reuters) - Peruvian President Alan Garcia's push to lure foreign investors to the Amazon basin has run into homegrown opposition, with indigenous leaders saying he has disregarded a U.N. declaration that protects their rights to control land and natural resources.

Thousands of indigenous people have protested in Peru's Amazon for much of the past 40 days, hoping to pressure Garcia to modify or strike down a series of laws he passed last year that encourage oil, mining and agricultural companies to invest billions of dollars in the mostly pristine region.

The protests, which have already shut Peru's pipeline that carries oil from the Amazon to the Pacific Ocean, underscore the risks of investing in a country with a poverty rate of 40 percent and a history of discord between wealthy elites in Lima and poor indigenous groups in the countryside.

"Peru isn't respecting the U.N. declaration on indigenous rights," Alberto Pizango, the leader of the protests and the head of a federation of indigenous and environmental groups called Aidesep, said on RPP radio on Thursday.

The declaration, which is non-binding, was passed in 2007 by 143 countries. Though Peru sponsored the declaration, indigenous leaders complain the government is ignoring their rights to decide how ancestral lands and natural resources are used.

Pizango has gone so far as to announce an "insurgency" in his push to have laws that Garcia passed thrown out.

On Thursday, after politicians complained he was being incendiary and moved to charge him with sedition, Pizango said: "To us, insurgency means defending our natural rights and peacefully resisting excesses committed by the Peruvian state."

"We recognize the government's constitutional legitimacy, but it doesn't understand indigenous issues," he said as he called for environmentally sustainable development.

PRESIDENT SAYS LAND IS FOR ALL PERUVIANS

Garcia decreed most of the laws in question last year using special powers Congress gave him to bring Peru's regulations into line with the requirements of its free-trade pact with the United States.

But critics say Garcia took advantage of the powers and passed laws that weren't required under the trade agreement.

Garcia's chief of staff, Yehude Simon, has pleaded with Pizango to hold a round of negotiations in the hopes of reaching a deal that would end blockades of roads and ports that have left jungle towns short of basic supplies.

Argentine energy company Pluspetrol has trimmed output in the Amazon because of the protests, and state energy company Petroperu has halted its crude oil pipeline.

So far Pizango has balked at negotiations, leaving Simon and his cabinet to try to hold talks with other indigenous leaders who have less clout.

The government has also dug in its heels. It has imposed a "state of emergency" rule, which allows it to send in troops to break up protests or impose curfews.

And it has refused to make a concrete offer to get rid of the controversial laws or give tribes more control over lands in an area that makes up 60 percent of the country's territory but has just 11 percent of its population.

Garcia, a former leftist who now fervently supports foreign investment, has sold dozens of concessions to foreign energy and mining companies since taking office in 2006. More auctions are planned in a country where mineral exports drive economic growth and the government is working to become self-sufficient in oil production.

"The lands of the Amazon belong ... to all Peruvians and not just a small group that lives there," Garcia said over the weekend. "The riches of Peru belong to all Peruvians."

The Peru Amazon indigenous oil situation: a primer

I haven't posted on this story much, but now that it's becoming big it's high time I got my finger out and said at least something.

The basic story is:

• The Peru government sells Amazon basin exploration lots to international oil companies (Petrobras, Repsol, Talisman, Perenco, Petrolifera)

• Indigenous locals are not consulted on the sale or the presence of foreign oil companies on what they consider ancestral land.

• Peru government ignores the locals

• Locals demand their legal right to consultations on the development and the right of veto on the projects as per Peruvian law

• Peru gov't ignores locals, announces to the world development for $1bn with this company, $2bn for that company etc

• Locals protest, organize marches, petitions etc

• Peru gov't ignores locals, but wiser oil companies such as Petrolifera defer spudding timescales (from mid 2008 to "some time in 2010") in order not to upset local populations

• Local protests become more militant, block transport routes (typically rivers and waterways in the region), take over local plants etc

• Peru gov't declares a 60 day state of emergency, calls in the army, states that all laws and rights are suspended

• Gov't and locals sit down to negotiate

• Gov't says "stop protesting or we'll crush you"

• Locals give gov't the seriously large finger.

There's lots more to it, of course (for example the threat to supposedly protected indigenous communities that are watching their right to isolation get trampled upon), but that's where we are today, people. Here's a BBC World report that has the latest from a region that will never (and I repeat never) allow oil companies to operate. The combo of massive rejection of the oil business and the extreme isolation of the region makes it almost impossible for companies to operate successfully over a longer time period. The thing is that the oil companies have gone into these deals mainly in good faith; they've been promised that "the locals will behave" by Twobreakfasts and now the fat arrogant bastard is losing face with the international business community. This does not bode well for the safety of the locals when Alan sends the army in, sad to say.

Perenco's idea of community relations: Shoot the locals

In Peru there are two conflicting issues in its oil industry. One you get to hear about quite a lot, the other doesn't tend to get much press coverage:

1) Peru is about to auction a new batch of lots for oil and gas exploration in its Amazon Basin region in July and has recently agreed to deals worth $650m via PetroPeru (yep, the same oil company in the centre of all those corruption scandals just a few months ago) with international oil companies.

2) Locals in and around the regions being sold off and/or currently being explored are on the tenth day of a general strike against the oil companies. They complain of non-cooperation from the oil companies, broken promises of investments in the local regions, pollution of the rivers and waterways killing fish and animals and the forcing upon them of new laws that will strip them of the rights currently held to decide whether the oil companies can operate in their ancestral homes. A specific complaint is how oil companies refuse to engage in the legally required consultation meetings with locals and, even when they do turn up to the meetings, refuse to listen to the other point of view and simply say "we're going to do this, this and this, like it or not."

All this background explains, in a more or less way, why the local Amazin basin peoples have called their general strike. As part of that strike they have bloked several main trunk route waterways to stop the oil companeis from operating. So two days ago, the French Perenco Oil & Gas company (people with a bad rep for pollution in Ecuador, it should be noted) took it upon themselves to break their boat through the barriers set up. When local approached the boat in question they were shot at by the people on board, according to this report. Beats talking to them every time, no?

Yet another lesson in winning friends and influencing people, neoliberal style. I find it jawdropping to think of a mindset that believes you can trample all over these people and then expect to have an operating oil well further down the track. If there is one place in the world where you need to keep the locals on your side, it's the Amazon Basin. Watch Joffé's 1986 movie The Mission for insight.

Borev scoops the world.....

....by noting that you gringos really will buy anything.

On the menu today is the book Hugo Chávez presented to The Hawaiian in Trinidad and Tobago. According to da boorev it stood at 54,295th on the Amazon sales list before Hugo gifted the gift. Guess where it is now?

Go have a look at the Borev post linked here to find out.


b

Maple Energy (MPLE.L): Rotten to the Core Values

Map of Peru with Pucallpa city marked

If you go over to the core values page at Maple Energy's (MPLE.L) website you read that.....

"We value employee and public safety and respect the environment"

.....as well as other things such as having high ethical standards and being committed to excellence. As is so often the case, this corporate babble isn't worth the pixels it's printed on. The following Youtube video came up on my radar today, thanks to the Red Ucayali blogsite that keeps a close watch on how companies in the jungle region of Peru operate.

It turns out that Maple Energy respects the environment a lot less than it claims in its corporate literature, because a local Pucallpa TV station recorded images of the Maple Energy emergency team mopping up oil pollution from a company pipeline leak. But that's just the start of things, because amongst other things in the report:

• The pipeline is over 50 (yes, fifty) years old

• It gets painted every so often by the company to make it look good, but it doesn't get infrastructure maintenance or any replacement.

• The oil leak recorded by the cameras is the fifth so far this year! Yeah seriously, in the first 10 weeks of 2009 the thing has spilled oil no less than five times.

• The pollution causes permanent environmental damage. As in permanent. Understand the word "permanent"? Good.

• The local chief engineer working for Maple Energy was very defensive when asked a few questions and really refused to give away any information about the leak or the previous spillages.
  

One of the other things that Maple Energy boasts on its website is the good relationship it enjoys with Peru government and officials. Well that one might mean something positive in good old anglosaxon North, but anyone who knows Peru can decipher that code very easily. It's also worth noting that the rich and influential Peruvian Pension Funds jointly hold around 15% of all shares outstanding. So it comes as no surprise to hear in the report that neither Peru's oil watchdog OSINERG nor the Ministry of Energy and Mines has so much as mentioned in passing the problems Maple Energy is causing to the Amazon Basin environment....so far, at least.

So maybe after reading all this you're not as impressed with Maple Energy as you could be and you'd like to complain in your own way. Well as MPLE.L obviously doesn't give much of a damn about things a letter to its IR department representative Alphonso Morante might not be the best method. However, as the IFC (International Finance Corporation), which is the financing arm of the World Bank, is a 6.2% shareholder in Maple Energy you might like to drop them a line and ask them how long they will continue sponsoring a company that uses a 50 year old permanently leaky pipeline that does far more harm than good to its host nation.

Reuters runs the Talisman Energy story

Hey, this is totally cool. Reuters is today giving more airtime to the reports about Talisman (TLM.to) (TLM) in problems with Peruvian locals that I wrote about yesterday. Good to see a big news agency picking up on a socially-oriented story down in deepest darkest South America, and some good quotes from the company about how TLM is definitely not leaving Peru anytime soon (and a nice zinger about TLM in Sudan at the end, too). Methinks there's a conflict brewing.

Here's the whole thing. Enjoy.

(PS: Talisman Energy head office has visited this humble corner of cyberspace 18 times so far today....so maybe they're a tiny teeny eensy weensy bit more worried about this issue than they're letting on).

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LIMA, Oct 22 (Reuters) - Talisman Energy , Canada's No. 3 independent oil explorer, said on Wednesday it had no plans to pull out of Peru, after local media reports said community leaders had given the company an ultimatum to leave.

The Calgary-based group, which is looking for oil in Peru, has two lots in the northern Amazon jungle. Several indigenous groups live in the area, including the Achuar people, whose leader has said protesters will throw the company out if it does not stop work by Nov. 15.

"We are not planning on leaving Peru any time soon," David Mann, a Talisman official, said.

"My understanding is we have all the agreements and consents we require from communities in the areas where we're operating. There may be other groups that are outside our area of operation who are asking for something different."

Talisman's chief executive met with a small delegation of Achuar leaders in April and said the company would not operate without their consent.

Protesters say oil work harms the environment and sows seeds of conflict.

"We, as indigenous people, reject the Canadian company Talisman. We do not want them working in our territory. We want the Peruvian state to respect us, and the armed forces to stop helping the company," Cesar Zuniga, president of the Achuar indigenous group FENAP, said on local radio.

Talisman, which operates in some 20 countries, was criticized by human rights groups for its activities in Sudan in the late 1990s and earlier this decade. Conflict over oil exacerbated Sudan's civil war, which lasted from 1983 to 2005.

(Reporting by Dana Ford; Editing by Walter Bagley)
((dana.ford@thomsonreuters.com; Tel. +511 221 2130))



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