Within hours following my release on April 25, I received a letter from the “Caducos” - historic leaders of the Indigenous peoples and farmer communities in Ecuador who have been fighting for decades to obtain justice from Chevron. I know many of the Caducos personally; some are close friends with whom I have spent much time over the course of my 250 trips to the region.
I want to share part of their letter with you:
“Today is a historic day in our struggle for justice, and for that we are very happy. Your liberation is a historical fact after almost one thousand days of suffering; we too were suffering although not like you and your family, who were the direct victims of Chevron's persecution. However, just the same, thousands of people have been suffering for more than four decades from the diseases caused by the toxins that Texaco left on our lands. Even many comrades who started this fight almost 30 years ago have already died: Rosa, Alejandro, Oscar and many others. In memory of them we must continue fighting until Chevron is forced to pay to repair the damage in the Ecuadorian Amazon." “In the name of old friends and comrades in struggle, we thank all the people, organizations and groups that supported Steven. At the same time, we invite you to continue supporting the cause of the affected Ecuadorians. Our resistance to Chevron is to protect all life and all humanity; but also to protect Nature and Mother Earth, which were deeply affected by Chevron’s contamination.”
This letter came from the leadership of the FDA (Frente de Defensa de la Amazonia), the profoundly important civil society group in Ecuador’s Amazon that courageously has led the lawsuit against Chevron since we filed the case in 1993 in US court. I traveled to Ecuador’s Amazon in April of that year with the innocent arrogance of a young lawyer wanting to “help” these people use the law to vindicate their rights. Over the years, I learned far more from them about life than they ever learned from me about law. This letter moved me deeply. Below is the last picture I took with the client leadership before my arrest by Chevron in 2019 as part of the nation’s first corporate criminal prosecution.
People often ask if I talk to my clients when I am in New York or whether we communicated when I was in detention. We talk on a regular basis via phone or Zoom and did so even more frequently when I was confined to my home. I had no idea when the photo above was taken that there was even a scintilla of a possibility of being locked up. You can see me in the back left of the second row. Directly in front of me is one of my best friends: Luis Yanza, winner of the 2008 Goldman Environmental Prize, and maybe the one indispensable figure on our team who has brilliantly and tirelessly led this case from beginning to end at the community level.
Now that my detention is over, we are hard at work preparing for the next leg of this campaign. Our plans will include a major trip back to Ecuador’s Amazon with the objective to put the focus back where it should be: on the Indigenous peoples being poisoned by Chevron’s pollution, rather than on the lawyers the company is attacking. This trip will be a major pivot point but it will take significant resources. (For those who might want to participate, please let me know.)
While I have been released, our work is far from over. Chevron has not yet paid even the first dollar of what it owes to the Indigenous Peoples of the Amazon. We must do everything in our power to bring the company to justice, to protect our planet, and to support Earth Defenders who do the tough work of standing up to the monster polluters in the fossil fuel industry.
Momentum is on our side like never before. Will you help fund this significant homecoming and power us through to the next chapter of our campaign by contributing $2500, $1000, $500, $250, $100, $50, $25, or whatever you can today?
In Solidarity,
Steven Donziger |
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Steven Donziger is a U.S. human rights attorney who helped communities in Ecuador’s Amazon win a historic multibillion-dollar pollution judgment against Chevron for the dumping of billions of gallons of cancer-causing oil waste onto Indigenous ancestral lands. Since the judgment issued in 2013, Chevron has used dozens of law firms and 2000 lawyers to carry out a demonization campaign targeting Steven to send a message of intimidation to all environmental advocates.
Donate NOW to help support Steven as he and the Ecuadorian communities continue their fight for corporate accountability, environmental justice, Indigenous rights, and Free Speech. DONATE NOW |
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