At a workshop organized by ORAU, the regional indigenous federation for the Ucayali region of the Peruvian Amazon, and OIRA, the indigenous organization for the Atalaya area within the Ucayali, the leaders discussed the pending oil drilling by Repsol and its partner, US-based Burlington Resources. Repsol has the oil concessions to some 1.5 million hectares of indigenous land, mostly in Amazonian rainforest, while Burlington is the minority partner in those concessions, known as Block 57 and Block 90.

The workshop took place as a regional strike against the gas exploitation project of Camisea was underway. The strike relates to the contamination the Camisea project has brought to the region, including three spills in just one year of operation, and the lack of benefits for the region. Participants at the workshop supported the strike.

The workshop, which was co-organized by the Amazon School for Human Rights and the Environment, revealed that the vast majority of the population in the Atalaya area is not aware of the oil concessions, nor of the environmental and health dangers posed. In Block 90, the explosions used in seismic testing have already led to serious impacts, according to local residents, including decrease and even disappearance of certain species of fish, and decline of hunting. Noise, deforestation and garbage left by oil workers in the villages also affect the well-being of these communities. Prostitution, sexual abuse by oil workers and alcoholism have appeared, as well as an increase in contagious and unknown diseases. There is a report that one community resident died of suffocation when he fell in a hole in a seismic line.

Oil impacts in the Atalaya area could be as terrible as those caused by Texaco in Ecuador, where people are now dying from cancer at a rate higher than anywhere else in the country. When people don’t know about oil impacts and toxicity, they don’t oppose oil, but they also don’t take precautions to avoid contact with hydrocarbons.

–Nathalie Weemaels, environmental consultant to the Amazon School for Human Rights and Environment