Total remains in Burma despite the repression and undertakes to finance NGOs in the country
Activists from the Extinction Rebellion movement hold photos of victims of the military coup in Burma during a demonstration outside Total headquarters in the La Défense business district near Paris on March 25, 2021. © Reuters / Gonzalo Fuentes
Text by: RFI Follow
3 min
Despite the fierce repression in Burma and pressure from NGOs against foreign companies present there, the French oil group Total has decided to maintain its presence in Burma.
Publicity
Read more
Total could not put an end to almost 20 years of presence in Burma without consequences for the economy and for the populations.
This is essentially what the CEO of the group, Patrick Pouyanné, explains in a forum at the
JDD
.
The latter indicates that the company will maintain its gas production.
"
It supplies electricity to a large population in Rangoon
", the economic capital, he explains.
The pro-democracy mobilization is largely based on shutting down the economy in order to weaken the junta.
A
boycott
widely followed by the population.
The NGOs called on the large groups present in Burma to join the movement by withdrawing, an appeal relayed to Paris.
Total operates on the
Yadana
offshore
gas field and pays the Burmese state taxes and “production rights”.
For Patrick Pouyanné, stopping these payments would be tantamount to letting the employees of his local subsidiary go and exposing them to "
forced labor
".
Failing to withdraw
from Burma, the CEO undertakes to pay to international and local NGOs, as much as he pays to the Burmese state.
Last year, 176 million dollars filled the coffers held by the junta.
Burma has many natural resources.
Its oil sector counts several international groups among its players.
The big foreign companies react in dispersed order to the appeal of the NGOs.
Many remain, even if it means temporarily suspending their activity, and outright departure remains the exception.
Electrician EDF
threw in the towel in
mid-March, suspending a $ 1.5 billion project for the construction of a hydroelectric dam.
The crackdown on the protest by the army since the military coup of February 1 has left at least 550 dead, including children, and more than 2,700 people have been arrested, according to the Association for Assistance to Political Prisoners (AAPP).
The toll could be much heavier.
Many people held incommunicado, without access to their relatives or a lawyer, are missing.
► To read also: Burma: the specter of a total civil war
Newsletter
Receive all international news directly in your mailbox
I subscribe
Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application
google-play-badge_FR
Burma
Companies
NGO
Oil