CONFENIAE rejects all kinds of environmental negociations [sic] on forests and extractive policies that damage the territories of the Amazonian indigenous nationalities and peoples of Ecuador. Considering … that all these policies and extractive activities and negotiations on the forests and biodiversity in our Ancestral Territories will have unfathomable consequences, including the extinction of our identity as Ancestral Nations, [our] loss of the control and management of our territories, which would subsequently be managed by the State, foreign countries, multinationals, REDD negotiators or Carbon Traders; which would result in unprecedented misery, hunger and extreme poverty, just like what is happening right now to our indigenous brothers and sisters in the Northern Amazon of Ecuador because of geopolitical, economic and commercial interests [the reference is to the contamination of soil, rivers, and groundwater caused by petroleum extraction in the northern Ecuadorian Amazon];
RESSOLVES: [sic]
1. To warn and communicate to all the grassroots organizations of the structure of the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of the Ecuadorian Amazon–CONFENIAE, which is comprised of centers, communities, associations, federations, organizations and nationalities, in the framework of the Resolution and Mandate of the Congress held on May 28–31, 2009, that the Regional Organization of the Ecuadorian Amazon, will not permit interference nor representation, nor allow spokespersons to discuss nor dialogue, let alone take steps to negotiate in national or international forums our Natural Resources that exist in our Territories.
2. The CONFENIAE will not negotiate nor dialogue without the consent of the grassroots on the issues of Oil Extraction Activities, Mining, Hydroelectric Dams, the Socio Bosque Plan, redd business, Environmental Services, etc., since certain entities, like the Energy, Environment and Population institution, the World Bank and Carbon Traders in alliance with Latin American governments are trying to negotiate the lives of the Indigenous Nationalities and Peoples [and] undermine our Rights to our Territories.
Read the rest of NACLA’s Spring 2013 issue: “The Climate Debt: Who Profits, Who Pays?”
