The Africa Progress Report 2013 presented at the World Economic Forum on Africa created quite a media buzz. With its focus on natural resources — the extractive industries in particular — the report describes a continent “on the edge of enormous opportunity”:

Over the past decade, Africa’s economies have been riding the crest of a global commodity wave. Extractive industries have emerged as a powerful engine of economic growth. Surging demand for natural resources in China and other emerging markets has pushed export prices to new highs – and the boom shows no sign of abating. Africa’s petroleum, gas and mineral resources have become a powerful magnet for foreign investment. With new exploration revealing much larger reserves than were previously known, Africa stands to reap a natural resource windfall.

The challenge facing the region’s governments is to convert the temporary windfall into a permanent breakthrough in human development. Effective and equitable stewardship of Africa’s natural resource wealth could transform the region.

The report, Equity in Extractives, and more, are available on the Africa Progress Panel website.

Al Jazeera English  is one of the few news organizations in the U.S. keeping the Deepwater Horizon story alive. While others have forgotten the disaster, Al Jazeera has broadcast a number of stories on the ongoing environmental problems in the Gulf of Mexico. The mess that oil made recently aired on Inside Story Americas.

The Huffington Post also featured an article by David Kirby on the Corexit scandal, Corexit, Oil Dispersant Used By BP, Is Destroying Gulf Marine Life, Scientists Say.

BP’s negligence prior to the Deepwater Horizon has been reported extensively. But had this accident occurred on land it could have been contained much more quickly.  Today oil companies are after oil that’s harder and more dangerous to drill. Disaster response technology has not kept up and one can only when the next disaster will occur.  A new article published in The Atlantic and Mother Jones, What if we never run out of oil?, describes the latest efforts to get at frozen gas miles under the ocean surface. A miracle — and a nightmare — writes author, Charles Mann. Indeed.

Dispersant spraying. AP photo.

What BP Doesn’t Want You to Know about the Gulf Spill is a new article by Mark Hertsgaard, and if you have ever wondered how the largest single, accidental oil spill in the world just vanished, don’t miss this story. It is an absolutely shocking recounting of BP’s massive, reckless use of the highly toxic dispersant, Corexit, which effectively “disappeared” much of the spilled oil and in the process caused untold damage to clean-up workers’ health and the ecosystem.

Three years after the spill, Herstgaard writes, the disaster has been largely forgotten. “Such collective amnesia may seem surprising,” he continues, “but there may be a good explanation for it: BP mounted a cover-up that concealed the full extent of its crimes from public view. This cover-up prevented the media and therefore the public from knowing — and above all, seeing — just how much oil was gushing into the gulf. The disaster appeared much less extensive and destructive than it actually was. BP declined to comment for this article.”

The article continues: “That BP lied about the amount of oil it discharged into the gulf is already established. Lying to Congress about that was one of 14 felonies to which BP pleaded guilty last year in a legal settlement with the Justice Department that included a $4.5 billion fine, the largest fine ever levied against a corporation in the U.S. What has not been revealed until now is how BP hid that massive amount of oil from TV cameras and the price that this “disappearing act” imposed on cleanup workers, coastal residents, and the ecosystem of the gulf. That story can now be told because an anonymous whistleblower has provided evidence that BP was warned in advance about the safety risks of attempting to cover up its leaking oil. Nevertheless, BP proceeded. Furthermore, BP appears to have withheld these safety warnings, as well as protective measures, both from the thousands of workers hired for the cleanup and from the millions of Gulf Coast residents who stood to be affected.”

This is a not-to-be-missed story of corporate malfeasance. Hertsgaard’s article makes clear that BP was using Corexit as part of a massive cover-up. The company wasn’t looking to clean up oil, but only to make it “disappear.”  One can only wonder how common it is for oil companies to use Corexit  this way. Last year I wrote about the environmental impacts of the massive Corexit dump in the Gulf of Mexico and I noted that Shell oil had allegedly used an excessive amount of Corexit to “clean up” the Bonga spill off the coast of Nigeria in December 2011.

During the Deepwater Horizon crisis there was much debate about what was worse for the environment: oil washing ashore or dispersants. Hertsgaard gives us the answer, writing, ”Nineteen months after the Deepwater Horizon explosion, a scientific study published in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Pollution found that crude oil becomes 52 times more toxic when combined with Corexit.”

Read the story here: What BP Doesn’t Want You To Know about the Gulf Spill

For more information on just how deadly Corexit is, see the Corexit page on BP Oil Spill – Crisis in the Gulf

Esther Kiobel

Today the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in the Kiobel v. Shell case, limiting the  courts’ ability to hear claims of human rights abuses committed abroad.

Lawrence Hurley of Reuters calls the disappointing decision, “a major victory for multinational companies,” adding that “the ruling is a major win for multinationals such as Royal Dutch that do business in the developing world and become embroiled in local political controversies.

“Those companies, which are still subject to lawsuits in foreign courts, fear U.S. courts because of the possibility of large damage awards,” Hurley writes. He goes on to note that, “The ruling is likely to affect other cases, including those involving similar claims against Anglo-Australian mining company Rio Tinto Plc over its conduct in Papua New Guinea; Exxon Mobil Corp over its activity in Indonesia; and Daimler AG concerning alleged abuses in Argentina. The companies have all vigorously contested the claims.”

Human Rights First goes further, saying the Kiobel ruling “undermines U.S. leadership on human rights.”

In its press release, the organization writes, “Today in its decision in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum, the Supreme Court gutted the Alien Tort Statute (ATS), a law that has been on the books for more than 200 years and for the last 30 years has been a critical avenue to hold serious human rights violators accountable. In a decision that will undermine the United States’ status as a leader on human rights, the Justices unanimously decided that the victims of the gross human rights violations alleged in this case were not entitled to relief under the ATS. Furthermore, a majority of the Court ruled more broadly that the ATS does not apply to human rights violations committed in other countries.

“Human Rights First President and CEO Elisa Massimino stated, ‘This decision so severely limited a law that has for decades been a beacon of hope for victims of gross human rights violations. The United States has been a leader in the fight against impunity, but this decision cuts a hole into the web of accountability. Human rights abusers may be rejoicing today, but this is a major setback for their victims, who often look to the United States for justice when all else fails.  Now what will they do?’”

Here’s the news release from Earth Rights International, one of the organizations fighting on behalf of the Nigerian plaintiffs:

Courthouse Doors Remain Open to Cases with a Sufficient Link to the United States

April 17, 2013, Washington, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court today issued a disappointing decision in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum (Shell), holding that the Alien Tort Statute (ATS) does not provide an avenue for justice for Nigerian human rights victims who were harmed when Shell Oil assisted the Nigerian government in attacking them and their family members.  Despite this, the splintered opinions by Justices Kennedy, Alito, and Thomas leave open the possibility that companies and individuals may still be liable for their abuses in cases with a stronger connection to the United States.

“We are disappointed by today’s ruling and the fact that U.S. courts have shut their doors to the human rights violations our clients suffered,” said lead counsel for the Kiobel plaintiffs, Paul Hoffman, of Schonbrun, De Simone, Seplow, Harris, Hoffman & Harrison.   “However, the Court has left open the issue of whether U.S. corporations and many other defendants can be sued under the Alien Tort Statute for human rights violations abroad.  We will continue to litigate those cases and we will continue to sue U.S. and foreign corporations in state courts and other fora to hold them accountable for serious human rights violations.   This decision will not deter those efforts.”

The suit against Shell was brought by Nigerian citizens who allege the corporation aided and abetted the military dictatorship in the torture, rape, and extrajudicial killing of unarmed protesters in the 1990s. In seeking to have the case dismissed, Shell argued that corporations are not bound by human rights law and that U.S. courts are powerless to rule on atrocities committed overseas. Overlooking the clear history and purpose of the Alien Tort Statute, the Supreme Court held that in cases like this one, where a foreign corporation acted overseas, the defendant cannot be held liable in U.S. federal courts.

“The Supreme Court’s decision further exposes how Human Rights abuses are given a low priority in US courts. This decision will ignite the Ogoni campaign for justice against Shell Oil and the Nigerian government,” said plaintiff Charles Wiwa. “We will never give up fighting for our day in court.”

“Today’s opinion was a missed opportunity to send a crystal clear message: the world’s torturers and war criminals are not above the law—and neither are their accomplices,” said Pamela Merchant, Executive Director of the Center for Justice and Accountability.  “In spite of the Court’s decision, the human rights community will continue our work to ensure that U.S. courts give victims what they were denied abroad: a chance to seek truth, healing, and a measure of redress.”

First signed into law by George Washington in the 18th Century, the ATS gives federal courts the power to hear suits by aliens for torts “committed in violation of the law of nations.” In Filartiga v. Pena-Irala (1980), a federal appeals court allowed the family of a Paraguayan torture victim to bring claims against a former Paraguayan police chief. Since then, victims have used the ATS against civilian and military officials, as well as multinational corporations. In the landmark 1997 case, Doe v. Unocal, a group of Burmese villagers brought claims against the American oil company Unocal for the brutal oppression of people living near a pipeline project.

“The ATS is a powerful tool; it has made a difference in the lives of many, from victims of torture, rape, and forced labor in Burma to civilians subjected to torture at Abu Ghraib in Iraq,” said Peter Weiss, Vice-President of the Center for Constitutional Rights who argued and won the Filártiga case.   “Corporations and others who commit human rights abuses should be on notice: this ruling does not make them immune from liability. The doors to the courts are still open.”

“Today’s decision could have been a courageous one for the Roberts Court, which has been accused of being the most pro-corporate Supreme Court in U.S. history.  Instead, the Supreme Court has ended the search for justice for the Ogoni plaintiffs in this case.” said Katie Redford, co-founder of EarthRights International. “However,” she added, “the Kiobel opinion suggests that other cases involving human rights abuses abroad may still go forward.  Corporations operating in the U.S. still must think twice before they cut corners and curb human rights standards to improve their bottom line.”

“Today’s decision is contrary to the development of customary international law since Nuremberg and is a step backwards for the United States standing as venue for the impartial adjudication of egregious human rights violations. The United States was never meant to harbor the “enemies of mankind” and this decision only gives solace to the perpetrators. This unfortunate decision will not deter the Ogoni plaintiffs from pursuing justice against Shell.” Carey R. D’Avino, Plaintiffs’ Counsel, Eaton & Van Winkle LLP.

For more information and a collection of the briefs filed in the case, please visit http://cja.org/article.php?list=type&type=510

And for an overview of ATS cases and resources: http://www.ccrjustice.org/ATSoverview.

# # #

About EarthRights International

EarthRights International (ERI) is a nongovernmental, nonprofit organization that combines the power of law and the power of people in defense of human rights and the environment. ERI specializes in fact-finding, legal actions against perpetrators of human rights and environmental abuses, training grassroots and community leaders, and advocacy campaigns. It has offices in Washington, D.C., Chiang Mai, Thailand, and Lima, Peru.

About Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA)

CJA is a San Francisco-based human rights organization dedicated to deterring torture and other severe human rights abuses around the world and advancing the rights of survivors to seek truth, justice and redress.  CJA uses litigation to hold perpetrators individually accountable for human rights abuses, develop human rights law, and advance the rule of law in countries transitioning from periods of abuse.

About the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR)

The Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Founded in 1966 by attorneys who represented civil rights movements in the South, CCR is a non-profit legal and educational organization committed to the creative use of law as a positive force for social change. Visit www.ccrjustice.org and follow @theCCR.

Whale off the coast of South Africa. Photo: http://www.telegraph.co.uk

That’s the title of a new report released today  by conservation group, Oceana. The report, which focuses on U.S. oil exploration, shows, “that marine life and coastal economies along the Atlantic Ocean are threatened by seismic airguns used in testing for offshore oil and gas. The United States government itself estimates that the use of seismic airguns along the East Coast – an area twice the size of California, stretching from Delaware to Florida – will injure and possibly kill 138,500 whales and dolphins, and disturb necessary activities for millions more.”

Seismic testing doesn’t just happen in U.S. waters. Read Seismic tests enrage ecowarriors about environmentalists’ outrage when South African authorities admitted that “preliminary seismic tests had been ‘quietly’ conducted between the Port Elizabeth and Jeffreys Bay shorelines two weeks ago.”

More on South African drilling prospects (from an industry perspective) from Offshore magazine: Deepwater drilling on the way off South Africa

Greenpeace was already raising the alarm on the dangers of seismic testing ten years ago. But alas, the rate of offshore exploration has only grown since.

Photo: Reuters

“This may be the week that the Supreme Court finally issues a decision in the landmark Alien Tort Statute case, Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum,” international law expert John Bellinger  wrote on March 24th. “Whether or not a decision is issued this week,” he adds, “most Kiobel watchers believe that the Court will rule in favor of Shell.  But on what basis?”

He goes on to outline various legal theories that may persuade the judges (and leave human rights activists discouraged). Read the post here: Will the Supreme Court Issue a Decision in Kiobel This Week?

We’re still waiting for the decision and in the meantime I’m posting an opinion piece by Lauren Carasik, Director of the International Human Rights Clinic at Western New England University School of Law. This piece originally appeared on the Al Jazeera website. I’m posting the article in its entirety below as it gives a good overview of this case and the larger issue of transnational corporate liability for human rights abuses.

Indeed, as the Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA) writes in its overview of the Kiobel case, “The stakes are extremely high because the ATS is the only avenue for most human rights victims to hold perpetrators accountable.  In the home countries of many victims, there is no legal forum available to seek justice.  The Supreme Court is considering removing the U.S. as their last resort.

“CJA has joined a coalition of human rights groups, survivors, former U.S. diplomats, economists, and foreign governments who filed “friend of the court” briefs in Kiobel.  We are calling on the Supreme Court to preserve the ATS as a powerful tool to give survivors their day in court and deny safe haven to human rights abusers.”

Will the US Supreme Court strike a blow to corporate accountability for human rights abuses?

By Lauren Carasik

The United States Supreme Court is poised to issue a ruling in the case of Kiobel v Royal Dutch Petroleum. The stakes are enormous – the case will determine whether victims of human rights abuses on foreign soil, who often lack any other viable legal remedy, can bring suit against corporations in US courts.

The underlying facts of the Kiobel case are deeply disturbing. In the 1990s, the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People was comprised of a group of activists advocating for environmental and social justice surrounding oil exploration by Royal Dutch Shell and its subsidiaries in the Ogoni region of the Niger Delta. Amid severe repression, nine members of the movement, including Dr Barinem Kiobel, were arrested, charged with specious crimes, tortured and summarily hanged. Dr Kiobel’s widow Esther and 11 other plaintiffs, all either victims of torture or relatives of victims residing in the US brought a class action suit in the US District Court.

According to the plaintiffs, Royal Dutch Petroleum, parent company of Shell, was complicit with the brutal Nigerian dictatorship in “a widespread and systematic campaign of torture, extrajudicial executions, prolonged arbitrary detention, and indiscriminate killings constituting crimes against humanity to violently suppress this movement”.

The suit was brought under the Alien Tort Statute (ATS), a law enacted in 1789 to confer jurisdiction on the federal courts to hear claims brought by non-US citizens alleging violations of international law. The ATS was an obscure statute that had been dormant for almost two centuries until a pioneering lawsuit filed by the family of Joelito Filartiga – the 17-year-old son of a Paraguayan activist who was tortured and killed by a police inspector, who was by then a resident in the US.

In 1980, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals held in Filartiga v Pena Irala that the ATS conferred jurisdiction for violations of universally accepted human rights norms committed by actors vested with official authority.

Several decades passed before the next ground-breaking development in ATS litigation, when victims of the Burmese military junta sued Unocal for its complicity with widespread and egregious abuses committed during construction of a transnational oil pipeline, including murders, rape, violent evictions and forced labour. After years of legal posturing, the case ultimately settled in 2004 for an undisclosed sum, and plaintiffs were compensated for the abuses they suffered. The case’s success prompted dozens of other victims of human rights abroad to seek justice from corporations under the ATS.

Human rights violations

The Kiobel case is the first time the issue of corporate liability under the ATS has reached the Supreme Court. In 2010, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, the same court that created the Filartiga precedent, held in Kiobel that the ATS did not apply to corporations. On appeal, the Supreme Court initially heard arguments on the threshold jurisdictional issue of the statute’s applicability to corporations, and then requested supplemental briefs on whether the ATS allowed for the extraterritorial application of US laws, which many observers considered to be settled law.

The Court held in Sosa v Alvarz Machain that the ATS applies to foreign violations of international that are recognised as “specific, universal and obligatory”, and courts have applied the ATS to violations such as such as genocide, crimes against humanity, torture and summary execution. Kiobel plaintiffs argued that the violations they suffered are universally recognised and condemned harms under customary international law. In its defence, Shell argued that “the law of nations” does not recognise corporate liability for human rights abuses and that the ATS does not apply extraterritorially. Legal observers expect a decision in the Kiobel case at any time.

In justifying its position against the extraterritorial application of US laws, Shell underscored the “adverse consequences to US trade and foreign policy of a liberal expansion of private causes of action against corporations under international law”. It also posited that the costs associated with potential liability “may lead corporations to reduce their operations in the less-developed countries from which these suits tend to arise, to the detriment of citizens of those countries who benefit from foreign investment”.

The assertion that all citizens of developing countries in which corporations act benefit from their activities is the subject of withering critique, and not only from the expected critics from the left. Former Republican US Senator Richard Lugar acknowledged the “resource curse” on the floor of the Senate in the debate on the Cardin-Lugar Amendment of the Dodd-Frank Act, arguing:

“Oil, gas reserves, and minerals frequently can be a bane, not a blessing, for poor countries, leading to corruption, wasteful spending, military adventurism, and instability. Too often, oil money intended for a nation’s poor ends up lining the pockets of the rich or is squandered on showcase projects instead of productive investments.”

The US State Department has also supported the law, noting that it advances rather than undermines US foreign policy interests.

Many human rights abuses are associated with the extractive industries, but also occur in the areas offorced labour, environmental degradation, the involuntary displacement of indigenous peoplesfrom their ancestral lands and others violations. In many of these cases, domestic remedies are wholly unattainable for those harmed, for a variety of reasons. The US is not alone in grappling with the liability of transnational corporations for human rights abuses: in path-breaking litigation, Hudbay Minerals stands accused in Canadian courts of complicity in human rights abuses in Guatemala.

The countries, industries and harms vary widely in terms of scope and severity, but they share a disturbingly common theme: the lack of consistent, effective and accessible remedies for the human rights harms associated with the activities of transnational corporations.

Complicating efforts to hold transnational corporations accountable is the fact that companies often construct a series of subsidiary companies that mask their true ownership, make it hard to impost corporate liability. Imposing corporate accountability is further impeded by other factors.

Logistically, many countries in the Global South where many transnational corporations operate lack the institutional and judicial capacity to manage complex litigation. Moreover, subsidiary companies often funnel profits to the parent corporations, leaving them with inadequate cash reserves to satisfy legal liabilities. Lastly, as noted above, governments may be reluctant to send a message of corporate accountability because those in power are often the most direct beneficiaries of corporate activity.

Establishing standards of liability 

International human rights norms have evolved over the past 50 years, though the primary focus has been on the conduct of state actors. Establishing standards of liability for non-state actors must follow suit. The rise of corporate economic power is highlighted by staggering statistics: 51 out of the world’s 100 largest economic entities are corporations and the remaining 49 are countries.

In the US, the wealth owned by the Walton family, of Walmart fame, is equivalent to the worth of the bottom 40 percent of Americans. If Walmart’s revenue was listed as GDP, it would rank 25th in the world, ahead of the economies of 157 countries. Given the unprecedented level of globalisation and the ascent of corporate economic might, the development of international norms and enforcement mechanisms for the accountability of non-state actors is essential to advancing justice and long overdue.

Various multi-stakeholder initiatives indicate a global concern about the potentially destructive impact of corporate activities on human rights. The UN-backed Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights represents an acknowledgement by some corporations that they should adhere to the “protect, respect and remedy” framework for safeguarding human rights in their operations.

Concern over the abuses often associated with the extractive industries in the Global South motivated the creation of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), now implemented by 37 countries. EITI’s strategic goals include minimising risk for investors and “strengthening accountability and good governance, as well as promoting greater economic and political stability. This, in turn, can contribute to the prevention of conflict based around the oil, mining and gas sectors”. But absent effective access to judicial remedies, these standards are purely aspirational and therefore, unenforceable

In the US, it seems disingenuous for corporations to argue that they are not natural persons for the purposes of liability under the ATS, while invoking the protections attaching to corporate personhood to justify their desired outcome in the Citizens United case. Citizens United generated a storm of controversy for holding that the government could not regulate the political speech of corporations by limiting their contributions to political campaigns. Juxtaposing these positions reveals that corporations are attempting to have it both ways: they want to enjoy rights of corporate personhood while avoiding its attendant responsibilities.

In effect, transnational corporations want to be immunised from liability for their conduct beyond the borders of the US, irrespective of whether a remedy is available elsewhere.

The corporations that voluntarily adhere to principles of Corporate Social Responsibility are likely not the vociferous opponents of accountability, and are arguably at a competitive disadvantage when others are permitted to violate human rights with impunity. Given corporate complicity in egregious abuses around the world, respect for human rights should not be a function of voluntary compliance but instead a matter of enforceable legal rights. The international community must demand accountability, and reinforce and reaffirm the practices of corporations that do take seriously the impact of their behaviour.

The Supreme Court’s decision in the Kiobel case should advance global justice by categorically rejecting impunity for human rights abuses in which transnational corporations are complicit.

Photo: KARK News

Exxon Mobil pipeline problems are back in the news and this time it’s in Arkansas.

From InsideClimate News:  A pipeline that ruptured and leaked at least 80,000 gallons of oil into central Arkansas on Friday was transporting a heavy form of crude from the Canadian tar sands region, ExxonMobil told InsideClimate News. 

Local police said the line gushed oil for 45 minutes before being stopped, according to media reports.

Crude oil ran through a subdivision of Mayflower, Ark., about 20 miles north of Little Rock. Twenty-two homes were evacuated, but no one was hospitalized, Exxon spokesman Charlie Engelmann said on Saturday.

In an interview with InsideClimate News, Faulkner County Judge Allen Dodson said emergency crews prevented the oil from entering waterways. The judge issued an emergency declaration following the spill and is involved in coordinating clean-up efforts among federal, state and local agencies and Exxon.

Read the story here: Exxon Confirms Ruptured Pipeline in Ark.

There’s a round-up of news coverage, including photos and video, at Treehugger:  Exxon pipeline breaks spilling 84,000 gallons of Canadian crude oil near Arkansas lake

These U.S. pipeline ruptures are getting more media attention now because of the controversial Keystone XL pipeline project that would carry Canadian tar sands oil to the Gulf of Mexico. But the Keystone project aside, the reality is that pipeline leaks and ruptures are, unfortunately, everyday occurrences. In January AP reported that ”pipeline spills caused by flooding and riverbed erosion dumped 2.4 million gallons of crude oil and other hazardous liquids into U.S. waterways over the past two decades.” Pipeline ruptures in rivers are particularly dangerous, but pipeline ruptures happen on land, too, where they can also cause extensive damage.

Graphic: New York Times

A few months after the 2011 Yellowstone River pipeline spill, the New York Times reported that, despite a decline in the number of significant incidents from 2001 to 2010, “the amount of hazardous liquids being spilled, though down, remains substantial. There are still more than 100 significant spills each year — a trend that dates back more than 20 years. And the percentage of dangerous liquids recovered by pipeline operators after a spill has dropped considerably in recent years.”

Following up on the paper’s pipeline safety reporting of 2011, Times reporter Dan Frosch wrote in December 2012:  A forthcoming federal report on pipeline safety has found that members of the general public are more likely to identify oil and gas spills than the pipeline companies’ own leak detection systems.

The report found that pipeline control rooms, which help monitor whether a line is functioning properly, identified leaks in hazardous liquid and gas transmission lines only 17 percent and 16 percent of the time. Control rooms identified leaks in gas distribution pipelines, like those that go into homes or businesses, less than 1 percent of the time, according to the report.

The study was commissioned by the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration….

The study found that air patrols and ground crews used by pipeline companies, as well as contractors, were more likely to identify problems on a line than detection systems. And private citizens and emergency responders were typically the most likely to find evidence of a pipeline accident, it concluded.

“It has been clear for years that these computerized leak-detection systems don’t work,” said Carl Weimer, executive director of the Pipeline Safety Trust and a member of the pipeline agency’s hazardous liquid technical advisory committee, which has reviewed the draft report. “The question for me is why have regulators continued to allow the pipeline industry to keep selling the public on leak detection systems that don’t work as advertised?”

This is just a snapshot of the pipeline safety problems in the United States, but when a federal government report indicates that members of the general public are more likely to identify oil and gas spills than the pipeline companies’ own leak detection systems, that’s cause for alarm around the world.

As I’ve written before, much of the Chad-Cameroon pipeline passes through remote territory where spills could easily go unnoticed for some time. And in these remote areas everyone isn’t running around with cell phones with cameras. Nor are there many TV crews with helicopters. I’ve talked to people in Cameroon and Chad who have noticed and reported oil leaks, to no avail. I’ve talked to people who have monitored ongoing oil leaks from rusting pipelines in Equatorial Guinea and Angola, to no avail. And, of course, there’s Nigeria, an ongoing social and environmental disaster on an epic scale — but who cares?

I wish that when reporting about pipeline risks and ruptures in the United States, reporters would simply indicate that this is a global issue. The stakes are high everywhere and in countries lacking clean-up capacity all incidents can be disastrous.

One of the many rivers that the Chad-Cameroon oil pipeline crosses. Photo by Christiane Badgley

“The U.S. Department of Transportation on Monday hit Exxon Mobil Corp. with a $1.7 million fine over a July 2011 pipeline failure that dumped more than 60,000 gallons of oil into Montana’s Yellowstone River after concluding the oil giant failed to effectively address pipeline safety risks,” writes Sean McLernon in the March 26th edition of Law360.

According to a news release from the Department of Transportation’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), “ExxonMobil failed to properly address known seasonal flooding risks to the safety of its pipeline system, including excessive river scour and erosion, and to implement measures that would have mitigated a spill into a waterway.”

I wrote about the Yellowstone River spill in September 2011 asking what lessons the Montana accident might have for Cameroon. To recap what I said then, environmentalists in Cameroon and Chad have long been concerned about the safety of the 1070 km Chad-Cameroon oil pipeline and have stated repeatedly that COTCO (Exxon Mobil pipeline operations in Cameroon) has not provided reliable information about its real capacity to respond in the event of an oil spill. Much of the pipeline crosses relatively remote and hard-to-access areas (few or no roads) and many question COTCO’s assertions that response teams could quickly travel to the scene of any incident.

In Montana, as in Cameroon, remote-control valves are intended to block oil flow in the event of a pipeline leak. But it took Exxon operators in Houston nearly an hour to stop the oil flow on the Yellowstone River. The PHMSA said that although Exxon had installed remote-control valves in Montana, the company failed to properly operate the system, resulting in the 60,000 gallon spill. Read the PHMSA news release here.

As I wrote in 2011, more than 1,000 workers were involved in the Yellowstone River cleanup. In the event of a similar incident in Cameroon, it would be hard to imagine such a response. Even if COTCO were willing to throw maximum resources at a spill, it would be extremely difficult to dispatch a thousand people to the Cameroonian rainforest during rainy season, for example, when dirt roads are often impassable and washed out bridges are a common occurrence.

The Chad-Cameroon oil pipeline crosses no fewer than 25 rivers. As in Montana, severe flooding has also become an increasingly common event in Cameroon. The pipeline, now over 10 years old, will likely be operational for at least another 20 years.

It’s important to remember that Cameroonians living near the pipeline route depend on river water. According to a University of Michigan study, “Even one leak would endanger communities all along the pipeline route because they rely on surface water systems for most of their water needs.”

Read the Law360 article here.

What happens next in Central African Republic  is anyone’s guess, but Chad is likely to remain an important player in CAR politics.

Chad’s president Idriss Deby “lost patience” with Francois Bozize, as RFI reports, and along with Francois Hollande, ignored Bozize’s last calls for support. RFI asks why Deby, who helped bring Bozize to power a decade ago, recently turned against him. Read the RFI story, Centrafrique: Bozizé lâché par Déby, ignoré par Hollande. My translation/summary:

Deby’s entourage says the Chadian president was simply tired of dealing with Bozize.  In May 2012 Deby went to Bangui and publicly called on Bozize to dialogue with the opposition. That was a sign of the tension already existing between the two heads of state.

In private, Idriss Deby reportedly asked Bozize to drop his plan to modify the constitution so that he could run for a third term…. Bozize had hard time accepting this advice from Deby who, himself, had modified the constitution of Chad to stay in power.

In the following months, things only got worse. Bozize suspected Deby of supporting the rebels….

Nonetheless, when Seleka launched its first offensive on Bangui in December, Chadian soldiers intervened. Ndjamena suspected  Michel Djotodia of supporting the Chadian rebellion. But by January Chad had received assurances from the Seleka leadership that Bangui would not become a rear base for Chadian rebels. This time there was no need to intervene.

Certainly the fact that France was not going to intervene on behalf of Bozize bolstered Deby’s decision. Deby has improved his standing with France by sending 2,400 Chadian soldiers to Mali. Deby’s decision to send soldiers to Mali does not have support at home, however. And with Chadian soldiers in both Mali and CAR, the Chadian army is stretched thin.

Was Deby’s decision to abandon Bozize also a recognition that continuing to support him could be too risky?  Several Chadian rebel groups had released communiques in support of Seleka and denouncing dictators like Bozize — and Deby.

And, interestingly, just a few days before Bozize fled CAR, Chadian rebels announced they would take up arms again against Deby, Reuters reported:

Chadian rebels said on Thursday they would take up arms again against President Idriss Deby after he failed to negotiate with them since they agreed to stop fighting more than two years ago.

The Union of Forces of Resistance (UFR), a rebel coalition, put down their weapons after Chad and Sudan agreed to end their proxy wars in 2010 by ceasing their support for insurgents in each other’s country….

“We’re tired of waiting. Our supporters on the ground are tired and are pushing us to fight given Deby’s obstinate refusal. We must resume fighting.”

The former French colony, one of the poorest nations in the world, has been rocked by humanitarian crises over the last decade including conflicts in the east and south, drought in the arid Sahel region, and flooding.

Deby seized power in a 1990 military coup and has since won a series of elections whose fairness has been questioned by international observers. He has dismissed those allegations and defended his record.

Erdimi was the leader of one of several rebel groups in a 2008 rebel coalition which attacked the Chadian capital N’Djamena in February that year, besieging Deby in his palace.

The rebels eventually withdrew, accusing former colonial power France, which has troops and planes based in Chad, of backing Deby. Paris said its forces gave intelligence, medical and logistics support to the Chadian army, but did not participate directly in combat.

Read the Reuters story, Chad rebels say to resume fight, Deby’s promises unmet.

Nearly 20 years after deciding that Cameroon needed a Senate, President Paul Biya recently announced that the country’s first Senate elections will be held on April 14, 2013. He made the surprise announcement at the end of February, leaving little time to organize a credible election.

Voters will elect 70 senators, while Biya will hand-pick the remaining 30, according the presidential decree read over state radio.

The SDF, Cameroon’s main opposition party, loudly denounced the elections and pledged a boycott, then in a awkward volte face several days later, agreed to participate. SDF party members now say the party will participate in the Senate elections as it does not think Biya, 80, will make it to the end of his term.

According to the Cameroonian constitution, the head of the Senate would assume the interim in the event of a mid-term presidential vacancy.

Biya’s planned senatorial elections seem to indicate that he is interested in perpetuating the status quo of Cameroonian politics into the post-Biya era.

Cameroon’s New Senate: An (Anti)Democratic Anachronism, by Dibussi Tande, does a wonderful job of showing how a little more democracy (the creation of an elected Senate) is, in fact, nothing of the sort: “The Biya regime has defended the creation of this second legislative body, which many consider an extravagance, by arguing that it will be a major boost for Cameroon’s democracy in terms of popular participation, strengthened checks on the executive branch, a less hazy separation of powers, and increased political transparency. From all indications, however, this is mere wishful thinking…”

As Tande writes, the senatorial elections are primarily an exercise in stacking the deck in favor of the ruling party that will create “a gilded retirement chamber for former high ranking government officials, and a prebend to traditional chiefs, business magnates and other individuals who have sworn an oath of fealty to the Biya regime.”

Read Tande’s piece here: Cameroon’s New Senate: An (Anti)Democratic Anachronism