Ecuadorian Anti-Mining Coalition Warns of Repression Under New Laws
Police repress protests in the Las Naves community, Ecuador, June 26, 2025. x/ @miningwatch
July 3, 2025 Hour: 1:23 pm
Economic elites and authorities use criminal charges like ‘terrorism’ and ‘organized crime’ to crush social resistance.
On Wednesday, Ecuador’s National Anti-Mining Front (FNA) denounced a smear campaign by mainstream media and multinational corporations targeting social activists and environmental defenders who oppose large-scale mining projects.
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More specifically, the FNA rejected defamatory statements made by Felipe Rodriguez, attorney for the mining company Curimining. He used media outlets and social media to label those opposed to industrial-scale mining as “strategic allies of organized crime and illegal mining operations.”
This baseless accusation puts Indigenous communities and other local populations at risk, especially at a time when President Daniel Noboa has secured the approval of new laws that expand the state’s repressive powers, the FNA warned, noting that criminalizing protest is part of an effort by Ecuadorian elites to undermine democratic consultation processes that communities have used to explicitly reject large-scale mining.
“Besides endangering our safety and lives, these slanders directly attack the decisions made through popular consultations by cantons Giron (2019), Cuenca (2021), and Quito (2023) to ban metallic mining in the Azuay water recharge zones and in the Choco Andino Commonwealth,” the FNA said, referencing mining’s impact on highly sensitive ecosystems.
The text reads, “Amazon women support Las Naves. Women of the Federation of Indigenous Organizations of Napo (FOIN) sympathize with Las Naves, a town which is being repressed and militarized to impose Curipamba-El Domo, a project of the Canadian mining company Curiming.”
“We are a coalition of farmers, irrigation users, and rural and urban activists defending our territory. We work the land and produce for our survival and to ensure the country’s food sovereignty. We defend the wetlands, forests, rivers and mangroves,” the FNA added.
This coalition accused the Ecuadorian government of granting concessions for large-scale mining projects on Indigenous, Afro-Ecuadorian, Montubio, and campesino territories without local communities’ free, prior, and informed consent.
“At the same time, we are facing an invasion of illegal mining operations that are linked to formal mining companies and government entities — a fact that has been documented by media outlets and national and international human rights organizations,” the FNA said.
“Those of us who resist this form of dispossession suffer brutal repression by the state and criminalization by both the mining sector and the central government. These actors use criminal charges like ‘terrorism’ and ‘organized crime’ to crush social resistance. In pursuit of that goal, the recent ‘urgent’ economic laws approved by the National Assembly threaten the freedom and lives of people who oppose mining.”
More specifically, the anti-mining activists said that the new laws on intelligence and public integrity violate constitutional rights by allowing warrantless searches, detention without judicial hearings, retroactive pardons for members of the armed forces and national police, and pretrial detention justified by the claim of ‘Internal Armed Conflict.’
The text reads, “We denounce that Salazar Resources and Silver Corp, multinationals partners of Curimining, are linked to the mining interests of the Noboa family, which is the source of police intervention orders against Las Naves peasant community.”
These consequences are possible because the laws promoted by the Noboa administration contain vague definitions of what constitutes a threat to state interests. This ambiguity gives authorities wide discretion to designate targets as military or high-value objectives, the FNA warned.
“In light of this situation, we categorically reject and denounce any malicious attempt to link the FNA to organized crime. This dangerous narrative seeks to immobilize popular organizations through punitive criminal harassment and to install the idea of an internal enemy.”
The FNA called on the Ombudsman’s Office to fulfill its role as Ecuador’s national human rights institution and to protect human and environmental rights defenders. It also urged civil society to stand in solidarity with communities resisting mining-related dispossession and to remain vigilant against possible “false positives” being justified under the pretext of internal armed conflict.
“We alert all national and international human rights and environmental organizations that the Ecuadorian state does not guarantee a safe or enabling environment for individuals, collectives and popular organizations defending human rights in environmental matters,” the FNA concluded.
teleSUR/ JF
Source: FNA