A Peruvian judge has prohibited four Repsol executives from leaving the country for 18 months for his alleged responsibility in the oil spill on January 15 at the La Pampilla Refinery. Among them are the executive director in Peru, Jaime Fernández-Cuestaand the managers of the company for Environmental Quality, Cecilia Posadas Jhong; and for Production, José Reyes Ruiz.
The decision has been announced by Judge Romualdo Aguedo and It has also affected the head of La Pampilla Maritime Terminal 2, Renzo Tejada Mackenzie. The magistrate has thus accepted the request made this Thursday by the Prosecutor’s Office as part of the investigations it is carrying out after the spill of some 6,000 barrels of fuel.
At this preliminary stage of the investigation, the Prosecutor’s Office has considered Fernández-Cuesta as “author” and the other three involved as “accomplices” in the alleged commission of the crime of environmental pollution. The Public Ministry has recalled that the Peruvian Penal Code establishes a sentence of between 4 and 6 years in prison for this crime and has stressed the need for the accused to remain in Peru “to clarify the facts.”
The discharge occurred in coincidence with the arrival on the Peruvian coast of the tsunami caused by volcanic eruption on the island of Tonga in the South Pacificwhich caused an unusual rise in sea level at the time that the ship Mare Doricum unloaded almost a million barrels at the La Pampilla refinery, in the Lima port of Callao. The Peruvian government declared an environmental emergency on January 22 in the affected area for a period of 90 days.
“Repsol has not had an adequate emergency plan”
The Peruvian Minister of the Environment, Rubén Ramírezstated this Friday that “Repsol has not had an adequate emergency plan”. “They have been given the tasks to perform and they have failed to do so,” he said.
“Minister @RubenJ_Ramirez_in the company of Lisa Kenna of the @USEMBASSYPERUand the head of the Ancón Reserved Zone -of the @SERNANP– supervise the cleaning and remediation actions of Pocitos beach in #anconafter an oil spill on our coast.#EnvironmentalEmergency pic.twitter.com/xPQTAgSdbr“
— Ministry of the Environment ♻️ (@MinamPeru) January 28, 2022
The Twitter account of the Ministry of the Environment has collected these statements after Ramírez visited the Cavero beach in Ventanilla to supervise the cleaning work. In this context, when asked about the legal actions initiated against the company Repsol, responsible for the oil spill, he expressed his outrage at the failure to comply with the measures and deadlines established.
He has also added that managers must be present throughout the investigation process and that, for this reason, the impediment of leaving the country has been suggested.
They seek financial compensation for the State
Ramírez, according to a statement from the Peruvian Government, added that a civil action has been filedwith which an economic compensation is sought for the State.
“And also for the moral damage they have done to the State; it without giving up the possibility of resorting to international courts“, has underlined.
Black beaches and dead birds in Peru after the oil spill
According to reports, “the crude oil spill constitutes a sudden event with a significant impact on the coastal marine ecosystem of high biological diversity (wild fauna and hydrobiological resources), and a high risk to public health; for what it considers the origin of the Declaration of Environmental Emergency”.
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