Amazon Frontlines and Avaaz Unite to Support Local Resistance Against Oil Drilling in the Ecuadorian Amazon
Ecuador / Global. — Avaaz, the international civic movement of 70 million members from all countries, has launched a major worldwide campaign to support Indigenous nations in Ecuador who are resisting a new attempt by the Ecuadorian government to auction off 8.7 million acres of Amazon rainforest to oil companies.
The campaign is live in 16 languages and amplifies the voice of Waorani leader, Earth defender and co-founder of Amazon Frontlines, Nemonte Nenquimo, who issued a heartfelt plea to Avaaz members around the world, including its almost 160,000 Ecuadorian supporters, to stand with her people in defense of their ancestral lands, as she rallies national and international solidarity to stop this auction and protect the Amazon.
At the center of the campaign is a looming threat: the Ecuadorian government’s attempt to discreetly sell vast tracts of pristine rainforest to oil companies, jeopardizing ecosystems, biodiversity, and the sovereignty of Indigenous Peoples. In response, Avaaz and its global and Ecuadorian community are rallying to support a legal and grassroots Indigenous resistance, deploying resources to fund court challenges, national mobilizations, and national and international advocacy.
The threatened rainforest territories are home to the Andwa, Achuar, Shiwiar, Kichwa, Shuar, Sapara, and Waorani Peoples, who have defended these lands for generations. Far from being empty spaces, these forests are sacred homelands, teeming with life, knowledge, and cultural memory. “This land is not empty, it’s alive,” Nenquimo wrote in her appeal sent to the Avaaz membership. “It pulses with the scent of rain-soaked earth, the wisdom of our elders, and the laughter of our children. It is home.”
As Indigenous nations prepare to take their fight to Ecuador’s Constitutional Court, the campaign will raise funds to support Indigenous-led legal action to stop the auction and challenge oil permits, fund community mobilizations from remote regions of the Amazon to Quito, sponsor media tours and advocacy efforts to expose environmental and human rights abuses, enable Indigenous leaders to participate in global climate and biodiversity forums and strengthen Avaaz and Amazon Frontlines’ broader efforts to defend Indigenous rights and lands across the Amazon Basin.
This isn’t the first time Avaaz has supported Indigenous communities in the region – this campaign builds on a powerful legacy: In 2019, Avaaz members backed Nenquimo’s successful and historic legal victory that blocked oil drilling on half a million acres of Waorani territory, now considered a landmark case for Indigenous rights and environmental protection globally, effectively protecting over 500,000 acres of ancestral land from oil drilling. Avaaz members played a key role then, and they are rising again to meet the moment.
“We stopped them before—and with your help, we can do it again,” said Nenquimo in her appeal, originally in Spanish and translated into Arabic, Dutch, English, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, and Turkish.
The campaign represents a powerful convergence of global solidarity and local resistance, aiming not just to stop oil drilling, but to protect a way of life and a critical part of the planet’s ecological lungs. The Amazon is approaching a tipping point. Oil drilling, mining, and deforestation are threatening not only ecosystems but the very future of the peoples who have kept these forests standing. The global Avaaz community is now mobilizing in solidarity with Indigenous resistance, recognizing that the defense of the Amazon is a defense of life on Earth.
For media inquiries, please contact:
Sophie Pinchetti
External Communications Manager at Amazon Frontlines
(+593) 93 9918899
sophie@amazonfrontlines.org
