Wednesday, November 4th 2009
“On economic policy, Latin American leaders face a basic choice: Adopt old style government-heavy populism championed by Hugo Chavez, or the market-friendly reforms instituted in countries like Brazil, Peru, and Chile? Research from the Legatum Institute, an independent policy research organization in Britain, should make that choice a lot easier.”
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Tuesday, August 24th 2010
Reuters profiles the Chevron Ecuador case: A run-down court building that also houses the local casino in this Amazon jungle town is the unlikely venue for the largest environmental damages lawsuit ever tried. Read More »Tuesday, August 24th 2010
Reuters also features additional details of the Chevron Ecuador lawsuit: U.S.-based Chevron Corp (CVX.N) faces a $27 billion environmental damages lawsuit in Ecuador, a case that has already dragged on for years and could last many more if it gets bogged down in appeals. Read More »Friday, August 13th 2010
A new article on the Chevron Ecuador lawsuit: The story of Chevron in Ecuador already bears a remarkable resemblance to that of Dole in Nicaragua. A U.S. company persuades a U.S. judge to toss out an alien tort claim on forum non conveniens grounds. U.S. plaintiffs lawyers then seek jackpot damages in a Latin American court (while being lionized in a controversial documentary). The corporation discredits the Latin American court by returning to the U.S. courts and alleging fraud. In Dole's case, a judge in California state court found that some of the plaintiffs lawyers had misled the court. In the Chevron case, it appeared that the actor most clearly discredited was the Ecuadorian judge caught on film discussing damages with an outside party. But last week, as the Litigation Daily previously reported, Chevron's lawyers at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher filed a brief asserting that outtakes from the documentary Crude, turned over by the filmmaker in response to a Second Circuit discovery ruling, suggest that the plaintiffs lawyers themselves choreographed an "independent" expert's report recommending up to $27 billion in damages. Last year plaintiffs countered coverage of the judicial bias videotapes by attacking the motives and background of the American who secretly filmed the judge. Explaining the newly released footage will be more difficult. Based on what is known so far about the Crude outtakes, outrage seems appropriate. While the footage raises interesting questions of filmmaking ethics, what matters for the litigation is the apparent evidence of collusion between plaintiffs and court-appointed expert Richard Cabrera. Read More »Wednesday, September 1st 2010
Discussion of the restrictions that Ecuador President Rafael Correa is placing on the media: Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Nicaragua have passed new media laws—all of them aimed at clipping the wings of privately owned news sources—and the call for “social control of media” is viral among lefty groups. (It was unanimously endorsed, for instance, by participants at an August confab in Argentina of regional leftist parties—which now govern 11 Latin American countries—called the São Paulo Forum.) “The threat to freedom is all around,” says Amaury de Souza, a Brazilian political scientist. “And it’s growing.” Read More »Wednesday, September 1st 2010
This article discusses Ecuador's oil exports and imports of refined crude: Ecuador is one of Latin America’s largest oil exporters, with net oil exports estimated at 305,000 barrels per day (bbl/d) in 2009. Read More »Wednesday, September 1st 2010
Ecuador signs second loan in two months with China: Ecuador and China signed on Tuesday a $1 billion loan deal as the Asian giant is pushing ahead with the policy of securing energy resources in Latin America and Africa. The fresh loan deal, which Ecuador's government signed in Beijing with the China Development Bank, comes just two months after Ecuador and the Export-Import Bank of China signed a $1.7 billion deal for financing a huge hydroelectric project in Ecuador. Read More »