A decision by the Ecuadorian government to pay Chevron roughly $220 million following an investor-state arbitration ruling has ignited intense criticism from Indigenous communities, human rights advocates, and lawyers involved in the decades-long battle over oil contamination in the Amazon. While government officials framed the dramatically reduced payout—far below the more than $3 billion the company sought—as a positive outcome, affected communities and their supporters described the decision as a profound injustice that overturns hard-won accountability in Ecuador’s domestic courts.
The announcement stems from a case Chevron brought to the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague after losing a landmark environmental lawsuit in Ecuador. In that case, Ecuadorian courts concluded that Texaco, later acquired by Chevron, deliberately dumped massive quantities of toxic waste into the Amazon rainforest, contaminating rivers and streams relied upon for drinking, bathing, and fishing. In 2013, Ecuador’s courts issued a $9.5 billion judgment for cleanup and reparations. Chevron refused to pay, abandoned its assets in Ecuador, and pursued an investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) claim against the country.
On Monday, Ecuadorian Attorney General Diana Salazar Méndez’s office announced that the government would pay the company “only around $220 million,” praising the figure as a favorable resolution compared to what Chevron originally demanded. Chevron echoed that satisfaction, stating that it was “pleased with the resolution of this matter” and asserting that the decision “strengthened the rule of law globally.”
But for the Union of Peoples Affected by Chevron-Texaco (UDAPT), the organization representing communities harmed by decades of toxic dumping, the government’s framing of the outcome was unacceptable. In a statement, UDAPT rejected the idea that Ecuador’s payment was any kind of victory. “The reality is it is a defeat for justice,” the group said. “For 32 years, UDAPT has documented pollution, environmental crime, and lives broken by Chevron, proving what should be obvious: Communities have not recovered, health has not been restored, clean water has not returned, and the territories that sustain life remain contaminated. A debt is not owed to Chevron. A debt is owed to the Amazonian families still waiting for truth, justice, and full reparation.”
Advocacy groups echoed this assessment, calling the arbitration ruling illegitimate and dangerous. Amazon Watch deputy director Paul Paz y Miño described the case as an egregious example of how multinational corporations use the ISDS system to circumvent domestic rulings and silence affected communities. “This illegitimate arbitration process is nothing more than Chevron abusing the law to escape accountability for one of the worst oil disasters in history,” he said. He also stressed what Ecuador’s own courts have long held: “Ecuador’s courts ruled correctly and based largely on Chevron’s own evidence, that Chevron deliberately poisoned Indigenous and rural communities, leaving behind a mass cancer zone in the Amazon.”
Paz y Miño said the idea that Ecuador should now compensate a company found liable for widespread contamination amounted to “the epitome of environmental racism.” He urged President Daniel Noboa to refuse the award entirely. “Noboa must not honor this ISDS award, and the international community must stand behind the victims of Chevron’s crimes and demand that the company clean up Ecuador once and for all.”
Human rights lawyer Steven Donziger, who represented Amazonian communities during the original litigation, also condemned the government’s decision. After Chevron targeted him through the U.S. legal system, Donziger spent nearly 1,000 days under detention. He argued that the arbitration tribunal’s conclusions do nothing to erase or supersede the public judgments against Chevron. “The decision by a so-called private corporate arbitration panel that claims to absolve Chevron of its massive pollution liability in Ecuador has no legitimacy and does not affect the historic $9.5 billion damages judgment won by Amazonian communities,” he said. “That judgment still stands as the definitive public court ruling in the case.”
Donziger emphasized that real judicial bodies—not trade tribunals—have already settled the matter. “The private arbitral panel has no authority over the six public appellate courts, including the Supreme Courts of Ecuador and Canada, that issued unanimous decisions against Chevron and confirmed the extensive evidence that the company devastated local communities by deliberately dumping billions of gallons of cancer-causing oil waste into rivers and streams used by thousands of people for drinking, bathing, and fishing.”
He reserved his strongest criticism for President Noboa, calling the plan to compensate Chevron a betrayal. “I also strongly condemn President Daniel Noboa for his plans to betray his own people by agreeing to send $220 million from the public treasury to Chevron, a company that owes Ecuador billions under multiple court orders for poisoning vulnerable Indigenous peoples with toxic oil waste,” he said. “Noboa would effectively grant Chevron a taxpayer-funded bailout financed by the same citizens who remain victims of the company’s pollution. This would be an outrageous dereliction of duty and a violation of his oath of office, warranting removal.”
The ISDS ruling arrives at a moment when scrutiny of corporate arbitration systems is intensifying globally. Critics argue that these tribunals give corporations the power to overturn democratically enacted laws, evade accountability, and impose financial penalties on governments for regulatory decisions. In Ecuador, public skepticism is already high: in 2024, voters rejected a proposal to expand the country’s participation in international arbitration, with 64.8 percent voting against it.
Advocates say this latest case underscores why. They argue that the award not only overrides Ecuador’s own judicial findings but forces a country still grappling with severe economic challenges to divert public funds to a corporation long accused of devastating Amazonian communities. Meanwhile, the contamination that began decades ago continues to affect Indigenous families whose lands and water remain unsafe.
UDAPT, Amazon Watch, and others say the international community should see Ecuador’s situation as a warning. They maintain that unless governments reject these arbitration rulings and strengthen mechanisms for corporate accountability, polluters will continue to profit while affected communities struggle for clean water, healthcare, and restitution.
As the dispute continues to unfold, the $220 million payment has become a symbol of a larger conflict: one pitting the authority of public courts and community-led justice against the power of trade tribunals and multinational corporations. For many in the Ecuadorian Amazon, the ruling is not a conclusion but another chapter in a decades-long fight to ensure that the company responsible for one of the world’s worst oil contamination disasters is held to account.
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