Foto: JB Alfaro | Rights of Nature Tribunal

At its 3rd Regional Session, held in Puyo, Ecuador, as part of the XII Pan-Amazonian Social Forum (FOSPA), the Tribunal recognized violations of the rights of Mother Earth in six cases of oil frontier expansion and called on States to uphold free, prior, and informed consultation and to protect territorial defenders.

The International Rights of Nature Tribunal held its 3rd Regional Session on the Amazon as part of the XII Pan-Amazonian Social Forum (FOSPA) in Puyo, Ecuador. The hearing continued six cases presented during the First Conference of the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty, held earlier this year in Santa Marta, Colombia.

Over nearly eight hours, Indigenous authorities and representatives, rural and fishing communities, defenders, specialists, and Earth Prosecutors presented to the Tribunal the impacts of exploration, extraction, transport, and refining projects for fossil fuels across different territories of the Pan-Amazon region.

The panel of judges was chaired by Patricia Gualinga (Kichwa leader from Sarayaku, Ecuador) and Gregorio Mirabal (Kurripako leader, Venezuela), joined by international figures including economist Alberto Acosta (Ecuador), Yuvelis Morales (2026 Goldman Prize, Colombia), Tatiana Roa (Ecosocial Pact of the South, Colombia), Alfredo Wagner (Maranhão State University and Amazonas State University, Brazil), and Mariluz Cañaquiri (Kukama leader, Peru, 2025 Goldman Prize winner), with Natalia Greene as secretary and Francesco Martone leading the Assembly of Judges. The prosecution was led by Earth Prosecutors, jurist Mario Melo, Ecuadorian lawyer Ramiro Ávila Santamaría, and Bolivian lawyer and activist Fátima Monasterio.

The session also featured a special address by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights to Safe Drinking Water, Pedro Arrojo-Agudo, who warned: “Water in good condition is not a luxury for the wealthy, it is a necessity for survival. We are rapidly walking down a path of self-destruction.”

“The earth cries out for justice, and it does so through the voice of those who make up the living forest,” said Mario Melo, opening the arguments.

Six territories caught in the same oil frontier

The six cases presented before the Tribunal reflect different expressions of the expansion of the fossil fuel industry in the Amazon and its regions of influence:

Ecuador — XI Oil Round (Bidding round in the South-Central Amazon): The Ecuadorian Government intends to put nearly 3 million hectares of pristine forest belonging to seven Indigenous nationalities (Kichwa, Sápara, Andwa, Achuar, Shiwiar, Waorani, and Shuar) up for bid. Communities denounced that informational workshops are being falsely presented as “prior consultation.”

“Would you let someone break down the door of your home, or take away your children? We are defending our home,” charged Alex Aldana, lawyer and Achuar defender from Pastaza.

“Mother Earth cries just as human beings do. When they strike us, our blood flows; when they strike or cut down the trees, the forest also cries,” testified Daniel Dagua, President of the Andwa Nation.

Peru — Block 64 and Petroperú (Northern Amazon – Loreto): Overlapping with 60% of the ancestral territory of the Achuar, Wampís, and Chapra nations, Block 64 has left behind environmental liabilities, abandoned chemical pools contaminating rivers, and systematic spills through the North Peruvian Pipeline.

“For us, our rivers and forests are our pharmacy and our marketplace. By reactivating the block, we are bleeding our mother dry. Would you kill your own mother? Our territory has no price, just as our life has no price. Let us be doctors of the earth, not its hitmen,” declared Olivia Bisa, President of the Chapra Nation, who also denounced having survived six attempts on her life for defending her territory.

Colombia — U’wa People (Boyacá, Casanare, and Arauca): The U’wa people described the threat of reactivating oil wells and blocks (such as Gibraltar and Morfeo) on their sacred lands, as well as the Colombian State’s non-compliance with the 2024 ruling issued by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.

“In our cosmovision, oil is the blood of Mother Earth; humans cannot live without blood; if we extract it, the earth will die,” explained Berito Kuwaru’wa, historic U’wa leader.

Venezuela — Paraguaná Peninsula (Sacrifice Zone): Decades of operation by PDVSA’s refining complex have turned this peninsula into a “sacrifice zone,” marked by round-the-clock gas flaring, black rain, toxic gases, ongoing spills in the Gulf of Coro, and high rates of cancer and respiratory illness, all under strict censorship and state persecution.

“Fishermen are criminalized for reporting spills. They fear imprisonment by the Venezuelan State more than the dangers of the sea. If the contamination isn’t stopped, the Gulf will become a dead zone,” warned researchers Erick Camargo and Emiliano Terán.

Bolivia — Tariquía National Reserve (Tarija): The Bolivian State has modified the zoning of this protected area and water reserve to allow oil companies such as Petrobras and YPFB to enter (Astilleros, Churumas, and San Telmo Norte blocks), prosecuting the campesino community members who oppose it.

“We live in schizophrenic States that declare an area a Nature reserve to protect it while, at the same time, granting oil concessions in that very same place, pitting parents against children,” emphasized Judge Alberto Acosta, backing the testimony of leader Ali Albino Marcado.

Brazil — Foz do Amazonas (Amazonian Coastal-Marine Zone): Petrobras is seeking to open a new offshore oil frontier (Block 59 and 47 other blocks) off the mouth of the Amazon River, threatening unique coral reefs, mangroves, and the food sovereignty of Indigenous peoples and traditional fishermen.

“Every fish that dies is a part of us that also dies. With the seismic testing and the oil threat, the abundance ended, and today we suffer from a lack of food,” stated Nelson Bastos, traditional fisherman and doctor in family agriculture.

A common pattern behind six cases

While each territory presents a distinct reality, the Tribunal identified shared patterns across all six cases: the administrative fragmentation of indivisible ecosystems into “blocks” or “points on a map” to conceal cumulative impacts; the lack or insufficiency of consultation, consent, and participation, replaced by informational meetings or the offering of incentives; the concealment or inaccessibility of information; the absence of comprehensive, cumulative, and independent assessments; contamination and the risk of irreversible harm; impacts on water, fishing, food, health, and ecological functions; and the intimidation or criminalization of territorial defenders, extending even to murder, as in the recent case of Venezuelan Indigenous leader Julio Rodríguez, denounced at the opening of the session. The Tribunal further underscored that Indigenous and community knowledge must not be treated as a secondary reference, but as expert knowledge that must engage, on equal footing, with scientific evidence.

Based on the evidence and testimony presented, the Tribunal recognized a systematic and ongoing violation of the rights of Mother Earth and of ancestral peoples and communities in all the cases heard, characterizing them as ecocide and ethnocide.

The Tribunal’s conclusions and recommendations: the Amazon as an integral subject of rights and a fossil fuel-free territory

Denouncing that extractive activities have catastrophic effects on Nature and Indigenous peoples due to their scale and profound impact, endangering life in all its forms and constituting crimes of ecocide and ethnocide through the loss of territories, the destruction of livelihoods, the rupture of the community fabric, and the threat to communities’ ancestral and spiritual relationship with their territories;

Highlighting that the systematic violation of the right to free, prior, and informed consultation is accompanied by the harassment, persecution, and criminalization of individual and collective territorial defenders, a pattern reflecting the general subordination of rights won by communities to the economic interests of extractive companies, with even legally protected natural areas giving way;

Recognizing that oil infrastructure projects are interconnected and cannot be analyzed as isolated undertakings, as they form a single extractivist model that causes systemic crimes against Nature and peoples, endangering the very foundations of life;

The Tribunal’s panel of judges:

• Affirms that the cases heard constitute profound violations of the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth (Cochabamba Summit, 2010) — the jurisprudence of this Tribunal — and of the rights of ancestral peoples and communities.
• Determines that the current and projected impacts of fossil fuel extraction activities on Mother Earth and on peoples constitute crimes of ecocide and ethnocide.
• Declares the Amazon an Integral Subject of Rights and a Total Fossil Fuel Exclusion Zone, and demands full reparation for affected communities and ecosystems.
• Calls on States to immediately comply with popular consultations held in Ecuador (including the withdrawal of oil infrastructure from Yasuní, as well as the consultations of Girón, Cuenca, and the Metropolitan District of Quito) and with the rulings of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, particularly that of the U’wa people of Colombia.
• Calls on States to respect and protect the right to defend Nature, prosecuting any form of threat or harassment against individual or community defenders, and formally recognizing Indigenous guard systems and self-governance.
• Commits to sending the final ruling to the governments of the Amazonian region, to the United Nations, and to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, and to accompanying, within its scope of competence, the process of its implementation.

Francesco Martone closed the session with a statement of purpose: “What we have heard today confirms that the extractivist capitalist model kills Nature and peoples. Our task is to restore rights.”

To view the full Tribunal session and individual testimonies, click here.