Correa threatens The Economist with legal action for telling the truth

This oil was produced by PetroEcuador, not by a company that left the country 22 years ago.

The Ecuadorian president, Rafael Correa, threatens the English magazine  “The Economist” with a legal suit for publishing an article on the contamination of the Amazonia due to oil production activities , see http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21586825-correa-gets-away-u-turn-its-hard-be-green . In this article The Economist criticizes Correa for his failed project to get money from other nations not to drill in the Yasuní National Park. The article also makes a passing reference to the fact that the oil pool in which Correa put his hand to “prove” contamination by Texaco* had actually been generated by PetroEcuador, the state-owned oil company of Ecuador. This company, as everyone knows, has been operating the area that Texaco left over 20 years ago. To pretend that a 20 year old scene of the crime, later trampled by others, can still show what really happened there at the time, reveals much ignorance from Correa. Actually, even when Texaco was operating this area PetroEcuador was its partner, in full knowledge of what was happening. The government of Ecuador gave Texaco a clear legal release when this company abandoned Ecuador in the early 1990’s.

The move by Correa illustrates the force of ideology over reason. Correa needs money urgently, now that Venezuela can no longer provide as much help as before. He has failed to obtain it from nations that he pretended to extort, by threatening with drilling for oil in the Yasuní National park. The legal action against ChevronTexaco is evaporating, after abundant discoveries of corruption and impropriety by the lawyers and experts hired by the plaintiffs. Now, he is trying to find ways to harass the free press and believes, somwhat naively, that he can impose his will on foreign justice, as he does in Ecuador.

He is in for another, bitter disappointment.   

·       Texaco:  now ChevronTexaco