Paris Tribunal: Hydraulic fracking

The Case Against Shale Fracking

Presenter Shannon Biggs (Movement Rights – USA) 

Shannon Biggs, Movement Rights

Shannon Biggs presented the case against shale fracking operators and all who were complicit in allowing such operations to go ahead (including national and environmental authorities). She explained how shale was a process of Mother Earth that had been 400 million years in the making and how the harsh violent acts of gas and oil extraction were akin to a rape on her body. Fracking is a violation against Mother Earth’s right to water as the source of life through leaks of poisonous and carcinogenic chemicals into groundwater and the leakage of methane into public water supplies. Fracking is a violation against soil and life cycles through causing a massive increase in earthquakes throughout the United States. In Oklahoma alone, the number of earthquakes has increased from around 5 per year before fracking operations to now over 5,000 per year in the region.  For Shannon’s presentation visit  Paris Fracking International RON Tribunal

Kandi Mossett,  (Mandan, Hidatsa, Arikara – North Dakota)  Indigenous Environmental Network

Kandi Mossett, Indigenous Environmental Network, presented a very moving presentation on The Price We Pay For “Energy Independence”: The Environmental & Social Impacts Of The Bakken Oil Shale Boom. Kandi gave moving eye-witness testament to the devastating effects of the man camps that had surrounded her community, resulting in harassment and sexual violence against children and women and how the industry was an assault on her people’s cosmovision as “water people” that connected them to the cycles of Earth.  Fracking of the Bakken Oil Shale has had a devastating social, ecological and spiritual impact on the Indigenous Peoples of the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation and communities throughout North Dakota and Montana.  For Kandi’s presentation visit Rights of Nature Tribunal Paris – Kandi Mossett Fracking

Geert de Cocke, Food & Water Europe

Geert de Cocke presented the European situation with respect to fracking. France and Bulgaria have banned fracking while the Netherlands, Ireland, and Luxemburg have imposed a moratorium on fracking.  He ported on active exploration in Poland, UK, Hungary, Denmark, and Romania and licences granted in Spain, Lithuania, and Belgium.  For Geert’s presentation visit Geert de Cocke Fracking.

Khaoula Chikhaoui, Tunisia

Enrique Viales, Argentina

Damien Short passes judgement on fracking

Dr. Damien Short, Director of the Human Rights Consortium at the School of Advanced Study, University of London, passes judgment on fracking as a violation of the rights of nature, at the Rights of Nature Tribunal, Paris, December 5, 2015.

For Dr. Short’s presentation visit:  Damien RoN tribunal judgement

For more visit:  Paris International Rights of Nature Tribunal

Also visit:  Paris Judges’ Statements.

Tribunal Video Credits: A special thank you to Panasonic; 2nd Side Adventures, LLC; Diana Weynand, Producer, Supervising Editor; Clément Guerra, Camera; Sophie Guerra, Sound; Editors: Sean Lea, Sachie Masuda, Rebecca Ryden; and Citizens’ Voice at the Paris Climate Talks.