Chevron Fails in U.S. Court Bid for Order to Restrain Ecuadorean Assets

[Judi Lynn]

Chevron Fails in U.S. Court Bid for Order to Restrain Ecuadorean Assets
QBy Patricia Hurtado - Jan 6, 2012 12:47 PM CT

Chevron Corp. (CVX)’s bid to protect its assets that could be seized as part of an $18 billion environmental damages verdict against the company in Ecuador was denied by a U.S. judge, who said the request could be renewed at a later date.

Chevron, the second-largest U.S. oil company, had asked U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan in New York to block the collection of the judgment and the “dissipating” of any proceeds pending resolution of the company’s racketeering lawsuit alleging that the plaintiffs engaged in fraud to win the Ecuadorean judgment. The company sought to “temporarily ensure the availability” of all assets while the U.S. case proceeds.

“Chevron has made no effort to quantify the damages it alleged has been sustained to date, let alone to support any damage claim with evidence,” Kaplan said in his ruling today.

Chevron was ordered on Feb. 14 to pay as much as $18 billion in compensatory and punitive damages for Texaco Inc.’s alleged dumping of toxic drilling wastes in the Ecuadorean jungle from 1964 to about 1992. The ruling came in an 18-year-old lawsuit decided by a judge in Lago Agrio, a provincial capital near the Colombian border.

More:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-06/chevron-fails-in-u-s-court-bid-to-restrain-ecuadorean-assets.html

[Peace Patriot]

1. "The ruling...by a judge in Lago Agrio, a provincial capital near the Colombian border." ??

"The ruling came in an 18-year-old lawsuit decided by a judge in Lago Agrio, a provincial capital near the Colombian border." --from the OP (my emphasis)

---

One wonders what Bloomberg (one of the worst Corporate News sources on Latin America) means to imply by this irrelevant statement. FARC guerrillas had a gun to the judge's head? Or maybe they know that the CIA has operatives in the Colombian military and its closely tied rightwing death squads and trouble is on the way--so Freeper propagandists should be alert to this provincial capital's name and location?

Somehow I don't think it's innocent--just trying to inform readers of...what? Where the judge lives? Where, in Ecuador, the suit was heard? Trying to imply that it was just sort of a "circuit judge" in an outback?

Something here. Sometimes you can get a good "between the lines" sense of what is really going on, by little phrases like this in Corporate News articles.

We can be sure that, a) Bloomberg wants Chevron to win and the peasants who sued them to be shot; b) the Pentagon/CIA are helping Chevron in any way they can; and c) the Corporate Press including Bloomberg will promulgate any bullshit the Pentagon/CIA cooks up along the border to cause trouble, help Chevron and punish those who dared to sue Chevron. Also, the Colombian military and its death squads and criminal cocaine networks (funded by $7 BILLION in U.S. taxpayer money) will likely be cooperating.

Since the collapse of the Bushwhack/Uribe mafia strategy, as to instigating war with Ecuador/Venezuela (the Rumsfeldian "miracle laptop" strategy), our Corporate Rulers/War Profiteers have been looking for new strategies with which to defeat the Left in this region. Ecuador (leftist government) and Colombia (rightwing but more peaceful government, to appearances--more peaceful than warmonger Uribe) recently signed an accord about security in the border area. So did Venezuela and Colombia (the first accord). Perhaps these accords have been targeted--by elements in the Pentagon, the Colombian military and the fascist Diebold Congress--who don't agree with the long term, Panetta/Santos "free trade for the rich" economic warfare plan (if that's what it is).

Anyway, it will be quite interesting to see if trouble in the Ecuador/Colombia border area erupts. Could be subtle (infiltration of Uribe's Black Eagle criminal network). Could be a manufactured military incident. Could be disguised or open assassination of people connected to the ruling. Or "riots"? Anti-Correa (leftist president) agitation? Or some kind of legal entrapment of the judge (a tactic that Chevron already used--on the first Ecuadoran judge in the case) to sully the ruling, the court and Ecuadoran justice?

Bloomberg trying to help its 'news' consumers specifically locate a place in South America gives me the willies.