These are decisive days for the Yasuní National Park, one of the world’s most biodiverse areas, because of the danger that its wealth of underground oil poses to this unique and fragile ecosystem in Ecuador’s Amazon jungle region.
Final efforts are under way on a text agreeing to a trust fund of 3.5 billion dollars, in exchange for leaving the crude untouched, to be signed Thursday Apr. 22 at the World People’s Summit on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth taking place in the Bolivian city of Cochabamba.
But Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa stunned environmentalists by saying there is "a great deal of exaggeration" about the impact of drilling for oil on the Yasuní park, located in the northeast of the country, in the course of describing his "Plan B" in the event that the trust fund, under negotiation since 2007, does not pan out. Read more (also here).