En Chile, el proyecto minero de oro Salares Norte fue frenado porque en el área del proyecto se encontró una especie en peligro de extinción, el roedor chinchilla de cola corta. Sin embargo, el área del proyecto Llurimagua hasta la fecha tiene, de manera documentada, 61 especies en peligro de extinción. Entre ellas: el Mono Araña cabeza marrón, uno de los 25 primates más amenazados del planeta; y la Rana Arlequín hocicuda. Ambas especies, críticamente amenazadas. La rana, junto con una nueva especie aún sin nombre científico en el género Ectopoglossus, se encuentra en los bosques dentro de la concesión minera y en ninguna otra parte del planeta.[2]

 

Los bosques colindan con el Bosque Protector Los Cedros, reconocido como sujeto de derechos mediante sentencia de la Corte Constitucional del Ecuador en 2021, que resolvió en favor de que  prevalezca su conservación frente a una posible exploración minera.[3]

CODELCO ingresó a Íntag en 2014, con la expectativa de someter a la resistencia local. En este tiempo, se han producido diversas acciones violentas, persecución jurídica y encarcelamiento a líderes sociales que se oponen al ingreso de la empresa.[4] Incluso recurrió a la firma de un convenio (confidencial) con la Policía Nacional con el fin de comprometer la protección de la fuerza pública a la empresa. En octubre de 2015, la Federación Internacional de Derechos Humanos, FIDH, incluye el caso de judicialización del dirigente de Íntag, Javier Ramírez, en su informe Criminalización de la protesta social frente a proyectos extractivos.[5]

En mayo de 2019, la Defensoría del Pueblo de Ecuador denuncia graves violaciones a los derechos humanos y colectivos como consecuencia de esta intervención empresarial en el proyecto Llurimagua.[6] Ese mismo año, la Contraloría General del Estado informa sobre incumplimientos de CODELCO en los cuatro años de su intervención en el bosque comunitario de Junín, y llama la atención a las entidades reguladoras nacionales por no haber insistido en la caducidad de dicho proyecto.[7]

Por su parte, las organizaciones comunitarias y sectores que defienden derechos humanos y de la naturaleza, han interpuesto varias acciones jurídicas para respaldar su defensa de la biodiversidad, el agua, y la importante producción campesina.

En este contexto, CODELCO, su filial Exploraciones Mineras Andinas S.A. e Inversiones Copperfield SPA, presentaron una demanda arbitral contra el Estado ecuatoriano ante el Centro Internacional de Arreglo de Diferencias relativas a Inversiones (CIADI), registrado por su Secretaría General el 25 de enero de 2022. Se trata del segundo arbitraje presentado por CODELCO contra Ecuador; el primero se presentó ante la Cámara de Comercio Internacional en abril de 2021.[8]

Vemos a estas demandas como estrategias de chantaje de CODELCO con el fin de que sus exigencias como inversionista minero cuenten con mayores garantías que aquellas que corresponden a la protección de los derechos humanos y la naturaleza que reclaman las comunidades de Íntag. Y aparentemente logró su objetivo, pues según declaraciones del gobierno del Ecuador, estos arbitrajes fueron retirados “tras acceder a una propuesta que reabre la posibilidad de explotar el depósito de Llurimagua”.[9]

Le pedimos, como máximo representante de los nuevos tiempos que vive Chile, gestionar la salida de CODELCO de Íntag por respeto a la decisión de las comunidades de esta zona de optar por la agricultura campesina y el ecoturismo comunitario. No caben procesos de transformación basados en expandir el extractivismo, que se traduce en más territorios y comunidades sometidas a la lógica sacrificial a la que usted dijo oponerse.

Esta sería una decisión histórica que coincida con los procesos de cambio que anhelamos y venimos impulsando los pueblos de la Abya Yala.

Cuente con nuestro compromiso de proveer a usted de la información adicional que requiera.

Atentamente,

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[1]  Ordenanza que delimita y crea el Área de Conservación y Uso Sustentable Municipal Íntag Toisán (ACUS-MIT). Disponible en: https://bit.ly/3NgvRIj
[2] La lista de especies bajo amenaza de extinción dentro de la concesión minera Llurimagua (hasta junio de 2022), se puede ver aquí: https://bit.ly/3zHpUAM

[3]  La sentencia de la Corte Constitucional del Ecuador está disponible en: https://bit.ly/3zTtubw
[4]  Se puede encontrar información relacionada, en el sitio de la organización comunitaria DECOIN (Defensa y Conservación Ecológica de Íntag) www.decoin.org
[5]  https://www.fidh.org/IMG/pdf/equateur666espagn2015hd_1_.pdf
[6]  Disponible en: https://bit.ly/3NaDZu1 
[7]  Disponible en:  https://bit.ly/3O9Yt7f
[8] Ver en CGIAR Global Revista de arbitraje de la comunidad iberoamericana del 26 enero de 2022
[9]  http://www.viaminera.com/poliacutetica.html/#Codelco%20suspende%20juicios%20contra%20Ecuador


 
English below

June 23, 2022

Mr. Gabriel Boric
President of Chile

Dear President Boric:

The signers of this letter congratulate you on your victory in Chile’s presidential election last year, and convey to you our respect and admiration for the fundamental changes you are undertaking on behalf of your people with whose destiny we identify, as Ecuador received thousands of Chilean exiles during the dictatorship. In addition, both of our peoples are involved in territorial struggles in defense of fundamental rights in response to matters involving our forests, mining, and the privatization of water and seeds.

We are tremendously pleased that the Constitutional Convention has included recognition of the rights of nature, among other matters that will signify greater guarantees for the care of life. We are also filled with hope on hearing your statement, during your inauguration address, that there will be “no more sacrifice of territories.”

Chile’s peoples and communities deserve to see this promise become reality. As do the peoples and communities of others countries in which CODELCO, Chile’s public corporation, operates, reverting to the same sacrificial logic applied by other transnational companies interested in exploiting the natural resources of said countries, in this case, minerals, ignoring the primacy of human rights and the rights of nature over capital.

In Ecuador, CODELCO plans to mine copper in a number of farmers’ and indigenous territories, some of which include protected areas. Since 2012, the corporation is registered under the name Exploraciones Mineras Andinas Ecuador (EMSAEC S.A.), with 99% of its capital provided by CODELCO. The Chilean state mining corporation has 31 concessions here in Ecuador, including 18 granted under the “large-scale mining” regime,” according to the 2021 mining registry.

One of the most important of these projects is the Llurimagua copper concession, located in Íntag, pertaining to Cotacachi, a county declared “ecological” and located in the province of Imbabura, designated by UNESCO as a Global Geopark. Beginning almost 30 years ago, communities in this territory have been alerting authorities about the danger mining poses to the sustainability of ways of life and the various species in danger of extinction. Their struggle stopped the Japanese Bishi Metals, the first company interested in mining the site, and years later they expelled the Canadian Ascendant Copper whose concession was revoked by the national government as a result of the social convulsion its employees caused.

In addition, Íntag is characterized by its extraordinary biodiversity as result of its location within the Andean Chocó bioregion and the Tropical Andes Biological Hotspot. At the local level, it is protected under the guise of ACUSMIT – the Municipal Íntag-Toisán Conservation and Sustainable Use Area  – in which mining is prohibited. Íntag is also within the buffer zone of the Cotacachi-Cayapas National Park and is an Important Area for the Conservation of Birds.

In Chile, the Salares Norte gold mining project was halted because an endangered species of rodent, the short-tailed chinchilla, was found in the project area. However, the Llurimagua project area to date hasdocumented , 61 species in danger of extinction. Among them: the Brown-headed Spider Monkey, one of the 25 most endangered primates on the planet; and the Long-nose Harlequin Frog, both species are critically endangered. The frog, along with a new species as yet without a scientific name in the genus Ectopoglossus, is found in the forests within the mining concession and nowhere else on the planet.

Íntag´s forests adjoin those of Los Cedros Protected Forest, recognized as a subject with rights as result of a 2021 ruling by Ecuador’s Constitutional Court which found that conservation of that area ruled out exploration activities by mining companies.

CODELCO entered Íntag in 2014, hoping to overcome local resistance. Since that time, the company’s presence has produced various violent incidents, judicial persecution, and jailing of leaders whose communities are opposed to the company’s presence.  The company went so far as to sign a confidential agreement with the National Police to assure protection. In October, 2015, the Federación Internacional de Derechos Humanos, FIDH, in its report on the criminalization of social protest against extractive projects, included the case of community leader Javier Ramírez.

In May, 2019. Ecuador’s Public Defender’s office reported serious violations of human and collective rights as a result of the company’s intervention in the Llurimagua project.  That same year, the Comptroller General of the State reported on CODELCO’s repeated non-compliance with laws and norms during the four years it had been present in Junín’s community forest and criticized national regulatory entities for not insisting on the revocation of its concession.

At the same time, community and other organizations that defend human rights and the rights of nature have presented judicial actions to support the community’s defense of biodiversity, water, and farm production.

In response, CODELCO, its affiliate Exploraciones Mineras Andinas S.A., and Inversiones Copperfield SPA brought an arbitration suit against the Ecuadorian state through the International Center for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), filed by the General Secretariat on January 25, 2022. This is the second arbitration suit filed by CODELCO against Ecuador; the first was filed with the International Chamber of Commerce in April, 2021.

We see these lawsuits as CODELCO’s strategy to blackmail the Ecuadorian state in order that its demands as a mining investor enjoy greater guarantees than those protecting the human rights of affected communities and the rights of nature which protect their forests. And apparently, the corporation has achieved its objectives as, according to a statement by Ecuador’s government, arbitration demands were withdrawn “after agreement was reached on a proposal to reopen the possibility of mining the Llurimagua deposit.”
 
We are requesting that you, as the highest representative of this new era that Chile is living, arrange for CODELCO’s departure from Íntag out of respect for the decision made by communities of this area whose residents have chosen small-scale agriculture and community ecotourism as their preferred sources of income. Transformative processes based on the expansion of extractivism which translate into more territories and communities subjected to the logic of sacrifice, which you also oppose, are not consistent with the sustainable activities mentioned.

This would be a historic decision which coincides with the processes of change we fervently desire and which the peoples of Abya Yala have been involved in.

We will be happy to provide any additional information you require for this purpose.

Sincerely,

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[1] An ordanance that delimits and creates the Municipal Intag Toisán Conservation and Sustainable Use area. Available at: https://bit.ly/2NgvRIj.
[2] The list of species under threat of extinction within the Llurimagua mining concession (until June 2022), can be seen here: https://bit.ly/3zHpUAM

[5] Information related to this matter is available on the website of community organization Defensa y Conservación Ecológica de Íntag – DECOIN: www.decoin.org.
[6] https://www.fidh.org/IMG/pdf/equateur666espagn2015hd_1_.pdf.
[7] Available at: https://bit.ly/3NaDZu1.  
[6] Available at:  https://bit.ly/3O9Yt7f.
[8] See CGIAR Global Revista, on arbitration by the Iberoamerican community, January 26, 2022.
[9] http://www.viaminera.com/poliacutetica.html/#Codelco%20suspende%20juicios%20contra%20Ecuador.