INDIAN ISLAND, Maine – Members of the Penobscot Indian Nation are spearheading opposition to a congressional resolution that would designate Venezuela as a state sponsor of terrorism.
James Sappier, former Penobscot Indian Nation chief, and Erlene Paul, the head of Penobscot’s Human Services Department, said House Resolution 1049 threatens not only a program in which the South American country has provided free heating oil to hundreds of American Indian and low-income communities for the past three winters, but would also jeopardize the good relationships tribal members have developed with Venezuelans and could impact oil imports for the entire U.S. Sappier said he has alerted the tribes involved to contact their congressional representatives to vote against the resolution.
‘’It’s the least we can do. Why would Congress do this? The program has provided a donation to the U.S. low-income and poor people of almost a billion dollars over the years when domestic oil companies did nothing.
‘’We’re worried sick that we’re going to lose the program because of this kind of frivolous attitude of some congressmen. But it wouldn’t be just the tribes that would be affected; it would be everyone. If you think your oil prices are high now, imagine what they’d be if we stopped getting oil from Venezuela – that’s 14 to 16 percent of our imports,’’ Sappier said.
Venezuela provides the U.S. with about 1.4 million barrels of crude oil per day. Indian Country Today.
International mediation arrives in Bolivia
by the El Reportero news services
On 3 April Argentina, Brazil and Colombia agreed to mediate in Bolivia’s political crisis.
The announcement follows the admission by the Roman Catholic Church that its mediation effort had failed, because dialogue between the government and
opposition was “impossible” given the current climate of “mutual distrust, pressure and violence”.
The three new mediators are likely to back the central government of President Evo Morales, as the Organization of American States and the European Union, are doing.
The danger of this is that Santa Cruz which wants more autonomy, will be increasingly isolated. The choice the autonomists have is either to back down or to secede.
Argentine agricultural protest exposes political difficulties for Fernández
The agricultural protest in Argentina is providing President Cristina Fernández with a serious test, although her government gained some breathing space on 2 April when the country’s four farming unions announced a 30-day truce.
The problem for Fernández is that the protests go beyond criticism of her government’s economic policy, and raise pressing questions about her style of governance and the political alliances forged by her husband and predecessor Néstor Kirchner.
The protest action is also inspiring similar shows of force by farmers in other countries across the region: Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador and Paraguay.
Court expert smacks Chevron with up to $16 billion in damages
LAGO AGRIO, Ecuador– In a long-awaited court report submitted as part of the final phase of a trial, an independent expert has proposed that Chevron pay a minimum of $7 billion and up to $16 billion to compensate for environmental contamination caused to Ecuador’s Amazon rainforest during a 26-year period when the oil giant operated a large concession in the country.
If the assessment is accepted by the court, the subsequent judgment likely would be the largest civil damages awards in an environmental case. The higher $16 billion figure could result if the court accepts an “unjust enrichment” penalty tied to Chevron’s actual cost savings over several decades for failing to use appropriate operational practices.
The lower figure represents actual costs to remediate soils around all 378 of Chevron’s former Ecuador production facilities, plus compensation for health care costs, a water system, loss of indigenous land, ecosystem impacts, infrastructure improvements, and other categories of damages.
