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Roundup: Ecuador Protesters Agree to Talk, Protest Leaders Released

Posted on: Tuesday, 23 August 2005, 09:01 CDT

Roundup: Ecuador protesters agree to talk, protest leaders released

QUITO, Aug. 21 (Xinhua) -- Leaders of protests that have interrupted Ecuador's oil production were released from jail after agreeing to end violent attacks and enter into talks with the government, officials said on Sunday.

Many of the protest leaders released on Saturday are mayors and other elected officials of the Amazon region where the protests were staged.

Officials in charge of army operations in the area said dozens of protesters would remain in jail pending the result of the talks.

The government declared an end following the agreement to the civil unrest that has forced Ecuador to suspend oil exports, a key source of the country's foreign exchange.

Some 60 protest leaders arrived on board military planes Sunday in the capital Quito where talks were expected to begin later on Sunday or on Monday.

Interior Minister Mauricio Gandara said late Saturday that residents of the region "had decided to end the strike."

"Reason has prevailed and people will be returning to work because the damage from the strike has been enormous, reaching about 500 million (US) dollars," the minister said.

However, the protesters, who started blowing up pipelines and vandalizing pumping equipment on Monday in the oil fields of the two northeastern provinces of Sucumbios and Orellana, said they would remain on alert as the talks proceed.

The protests were launched to demand greater spending on infrastructure, employment of local workers by foreign petroleum companies and the expulsion of two foreign oil firms from the two provinces.

The protests have forced Ecuador to suspend oil exports, costing the country some 30 million dollars a day in lost revenues.

It also fanned fears of a supply shortage on the already strained world oil market and oil futures in the United States went up two dollars to more than 65 dollars a barrel on Friday.

The government had deployed troops to the region to lift roadblocks and protect oil facilities from further attacks.

Normal daily production of Ecuador's state oil firm Petroecuador is 210,000 barrels, and private oil companies produce an additional 340,000 barrels a day. But their production plummeted to about 150,000 barrels a day after the protests began.

Petroecuador said on Saturday that it had restored 33,167 barrels of oil output, but the production was still about 168,000 barrels short of normal daily capacity. The government said it will take until November to fully restore the company's production.

Amid the oil stoppages, Venezuela has offered to make up the shortfalls in Ecuador's oil export commitments.

President Hugo Chavez, who was on a visit to Cuba, said Venezuela would lend Ecuador the oil it needs and the country could pay back after it recovered its full production capacity.

Ecuador also plans to import fuel for domestic use and seek a loan from the Latin American Reserve Fund to avoid balance-of- payment problems.

Source: Xinhua News Agency - CEIS

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