Why boycott ExxonMobil? All oil companies are bad, aren't they? Polluting the atmosphere, creating wars, displacing families, and exiling millions to poverty seems to be the going trend with these gargantuan corporations. There are degrees however. Greenpeace and Campaign ExxonMobil, among others, have been working to bring attention to ExxonMobils misdeeds.
According to documents Greenpeace has received ExxonMobil has been instrumental in sabotaging the Kyoto Protocol and removing key voices seeking to address the issues of global warming from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. ExxonMobil has also been bankrolling PR efforts aimed at silencing scientific inquiry into global warming issues and promoting 'bad science' from groups such as the Competitive Enterprise Institute (which led the campaign in 2002 to dissuade Bush from attending the Earth Summit in Johannesburg), the George C. Marshall Institute, and Frontiers for Freedom. This information and more is available at www.dontbyuyexxonmobil.org
Other organizations looking at ExxonMobil as a pariah include Campaign ExxonMobil, from which the below has been excerpted
"When Exxon and Mobil merged in November 1999, it created the largest private oil company in the world. The new megacorporation has 15,913 U.S. outlets, $ 233 billion in sales, and the top spot on the Fortune 500 list. ExxonMobil sells gas under its own name and operates the On the Run chain of convenience stores. Black marks: Exxon infamously refuses to pay $ 5 billion in punitive damages ordered by an Alaska court after the 1989 Valdez tanker oil spill. The company spent $ 2.2 billion on cleanup but never took responsibility for the accident. Exxon has since developed a reputation as one of the industry's most outspoken opponents of stronger environmental regulations. The company also spilled more than 500,000 gallons near Staten Island, New York, in January 1990. Fines levied against it include:
* $ 4.7 million for nearly 200 violations of the Clean Air Act, as cited by the EPA in 1998;
* $ 4.8 million in damages (along with Tosco) in August 1998 for discharging carcinogenic selenium into the San Francisco Bay.
ExxonMobil is one of the "Dirty Four" seeking to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In March, ExxonMobil suspended production at the Arun gas fields in Aceh, Indonesia, citing increased violence by separatist groups. Active in the country for 30 years, Mobil has been dogged by controversy over how much it knew about the Indonesian military's violent counterinsurgency campaign.
The merged company's 25-year, $ 3.5 billion project to build a pipeline from land-locked Chad to the Atlantic coast of Cameroon would cut through the rainforest home of indigenous communities. (For more information, see www.sierraclub.org/human-rights/chadcam/index.asp.)
[BBB] Refining record: Of the nine Exxon and Mobil refineries Environmental Defense evaluated, Exxon had two refineries in the bottom 20 percent and Mobil had one.
...ExxonMobil chairman and CEO Lee R. Raymond still insists that there's "uncertainty" over whether global warming is created by human activity or natural causes, and Exxon has contributed financially (along with Chevron) to public-relations efforts that promote the work of climate-science skeptics. Environmentalists in Europe are boycotting ExxonMobil--known there as Esso--until the company accepts the Kyoto Protocol. (Visit www.stopesso.com for details.)"
http://www.campaignexxonmobil.org/learn/news_sierra_090101.html>
And then there is Aceh, Indonesia, which just saw rampaging gangs tearing apartt communities through nightime attacks, torture, rape, and arson. Indonesian army forces were probably at the center of the destruction, and they are in Aceh to 'protect' ExxonMobil's assets
http://www.campaignexxonmobil.org/learn/news_time_080601.html
Being a part of this new war on humanity is a shared psychopathology between ExxonMobil and their man in DC, Bush. Are we to be a part of this madness? To doom these villagers in Indonesia to incessant terror and ourselves to a carcinogenic and storm/drought battered future due to climate change is not the way the most developed nation on the planet should lead. This corporate monolith has no compassion and cares not for your or anyone else's safety. So tear up your ExxonMobil cards and dab some blood red paint on them and mail them back to:
Chairman Lee Raymond
ExxonMobil
5959 Las Colinas Blvd.
Las Colinas, TX 75039
And don't buy their products. This boycott has been very successful in Europe, let's bring it on home.
From Reuters
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=2911294
Indonesia Red Cross Says Removes 151 Bodies in Aceh
Wed June 11, 2003 07:48 AM ET
BANDA ACEH, Indonesia (Reuters) - Indonesia's Red Cross said Wednesday it had taken 151 bodies to hospitals and morgues in Aceh since a fresh military offensive against rebels began, adding all victims had been wearing civilian clothes.
But Iyang Sukandar, secretary-general of the Indonesian Red Cross, told Reuters this did not mean the dead were civilians. The Red Cross has said it was not its job to determine the identity of those killed in the offensive, now into its fourth week.
"The latest figure that I received was Saturday. It was 151 casualties," Sukandar said by telephone, adding more updated figures were not available because of communications problems.
He said the bodies were only those removed by the Red Cross.
Sukandar declined to say if all 151 had been killed in conflict zones in the province on the northern tip of Sumatra island, although evacuating bodies from the battlefield had been one of their prime responsibilities since fighting erupted.
"Their identities were not clear, all of them wore civilian clothing. But if I have to say that they were civilians, then I'm not sure," Sukandar said.
AMERICAN IN DANGER
Scores of people have been killed in the offensive that began on May 19 aimed at crushing the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), which has been fighting for independence in the resource-rich province for 27 years.
Indonesian military officials in Banda Aceh, the provincial capital, said Wednesday 21 government troops had been killed in the offensive.
The military puts the number of GAM fighters killed at 172. It says three policemen and one civilian had been killed. Rebel sources say scores of civilians and hundreds of government troops have been killed.
More than 25,000 people have fled their homes because of the fighting, which Jakarta has said could last up to six months.
A German tourist became the first known foreigner to die in the offensive, shot by the military on June 4 when he did not identify himself to a night patrol.
A second foreigner, American William Nessen, has been reported as being in danger in Aceh.
The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said Nessen was with a group of rebel fighters attacked by the military Tuesday, and before his satellite phone went dead had told his wife his attempt to surrender was met with gunfire.
The committee has written to President Megawati Sukarnoputri saying Nessen, whom it identified as a freelance journalist, "has come under direct attack from Indonesian government soldiers, and his life is currently at great risk."
It urged Megawati to ensure his safe passage out of Aceh.
Indonesian military spokesman in Aceh, Colonel Ditya Sudarsono, told Reuters the military did not know the journalist's exact whereabouts.
"If it is true that he is embedded with GAM, our concern is that if we attacked GAM and he caught a bullet, then we are going to be blamed again," Sudarsono said.
Top Indonesian officials have said the presence of foreigners in Aceh was a problem and their activities might be curbed.
