At COP30 & beyond, the fight for climate justice must end corporate impunity (commentary)

As climate treaty delegates gather in Bonn this week ahead of COP30 in Belém, Brazil, later this year, the world needs to confront a truth usually omitted from such negotiations: the climate crisis is not just a political failure, but the result of unchecked corporate power.
In this commentary, Ecuadorian lawyer, activist and Goldman Environmental Prize winner Pablo Fajardo — who led one of the world’s largest legal battles against Chevron for its toxic legacy in the Amazon — argues that the climate crisis cannot be solved without confronting the corporate power structures driving it.
Despite a $9.5 billion ruling against Chevron, the company has used international arbitration as a weapon to evade responsibility, highlighting how international commercial courts and legal loopholes protect companies like them: “At COP30 and beyond, if we are serious about climate justice, we must confront the machinery of impunity and fight united for system change and a future where justice is not the privilege of the powerful, but the right of all.”
This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily of Mongabay.

The climate crisis demands urgent action by governments to reduce emissions and to transition to new renewable energy systems for people. This means that fossil fuel corporations must be forced to stop polluting and end their decades of destruction. I am writing this from the heart of the Ecuadorian Amazon, where the struggle of Indigenous and frontline communities offers a warning to the world: there is a dark legacy of devastation caused by the fossil fuel industry that must not be forgotten. Climate justice cannot be achieved so long as corporate impunity reigns.

Chevron’s crimes in Ecuador are well documented. For nearly four decades, the transnational corporation extracted oil from our lands with utter disregard for life, intentionally dumping more than 60 billion liters (16 billion gallons) of toxic waste into rivers and leaving 880 open pits of poison across 480 hectares (nearly 1,200 acres) of rainforest. The company made tens of billions in profits from this devastation, and when it finally seemed like it was going to be held accountable, packed up and fled the country.

Chevron on the run

After years of legal struggle led by affected communities, Ecuador’s courts ordered Chevron to pay $9.5 billion to clean up its mess and compensate those harmed. Instead of honoring the ruling, Chevron launched a global campaign to escape accountability — one that reveals how today’s legal and financial systems are rigged to serve corporate interests, not human rights.

Chevron has filed dozens of retaliatory lawsuits against Indigenous leaders, lawyers, NGOs and allies worldwide, seeking to isolate us. The company hired spies and private security agents to surveil, intimidate and harass those involved in our fight for justice. Now, through international arbitration — a secretive, pro-corporate legal system — Chevron has sued the state of Ecuador to block the enforcement of the judgment.

Activist holding a stick aloft during the occupation of Dannenroder Forest in Germany, to prevent construction of a new highway. Image courtesy of Alberto Mazzieri / Climate Visuals Countdown.

This is far from an isolated case. Around the world, transnational corporations use Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) systems to bully governments and evade responsibility. These corporate courts operate behind closed doors, with no role for affected communities and no consideration of human or environmental rights. If a company claims that an environmental regulation or court decision affects its profits, it can sue the state, and more often than not, it wins.

But if a child dies from drinking poisoned river water? If an Indigenous community loses its land, its health and its future? Where is their justice?

On the frontlines against the architecture of impunity

Again and again, corporations are committing crimes against people and the planet and walking away untouched. Meanwhile, it is the poorest and most marginalized who suffer the worst. In the Ecuadorian Amazon, we are already living the compounded reality of climate collapse and corporate crimes.

In 2024, our region faced one of its worst droughts in history. Rivers dried up, leaving hundreds of communities isolated. Fish died en masse in polluted waters. With rainfall scarce, people had no choice but to drink water contaminated with oil and mining waste. Children fell ill and elders died. All this is made worse by the clear inaction of governments, which are often busy protecting corporate criminals rather than their people or future generations.

Justice for affected communities must be at the heart of the global climate fight. We are not collateral damage in the race for endless profits. We are not statistics in sustainability reports. We are people with rights, with dignity and with a message the world needs to hear: without justice, there is no true climate action.

Chevron sets the standard for corporate impunity and is the best reflection of corporate crime, but our fight is not just about one company. In winning justice against Chevron, we plan to set a global precedent. We want to show that no polluter, however powerful, is above accountability. That is why this battle matters for every movement fighting for climate and environmental justice. The same transnational machinery that protects Chevron protects other fossil fuel, mining, agribusiness and financial interests, fueling climate breakdown. If we do not confront this machinery head-on, climate pledges will remain hollow.

A coal miner walking barefoot through heaps of coal dust at a coal mine and processing plant, Jharkand, India. Image courtesy of Rajesh Kumar Singh / Climate Visuals Countdown. — Coal power companies like this still account for 40% of global CO2 emissions, despite decades of knowledge about their contribution to climate change. Here, a coal miner walks barefoot through heaps of coal dust at a plant in Jharkand, India. Image courtesy of Rajesh Kumar Singh / Climate Visuals Countdown.

On the road to Belém

As we approach COP30, the global climate movement must stand with those on the frontlines of extraction and destruction. With movements converging at the Peoples’ Summit at the same time as COP, we need to ensure that justice for affected communities is put front and center.

These times reflect a dire need for system change. We need an end to corporate immunity. We need international frameworks that hold polluters accountable rather than shield them. And we need to dismantle ISDS systems that place corporate profit above human life and ecological survival.

I have spent more than 30 years in this fight. I have seen friends threatened, families poisoned, and forests destroyed. But I have also seen the unbreakable spirit of my people and of communities around the world who refuse to be silenced.

I live among the trees, the rivers, the rain, and the extraordinary biodiversity of the Amazon. I live in a land wounded by corporate greed, yet still alive with resistance. Our struggle is not only for our rainforest but for all peoples, for future generations, for the Earth itself.

At COP30 and beyond, if we are serious about climate justice, we must confront the machinery of impunity and fight united for system change and a future where justice is not the privilege of the powerful, but the right of all.

Pablo Fajardo is a Goldman Environmental Prize winner, Ecuadorian activist and lawyer with the Union of People Affected by Texaco (now Chevron) and Friends of the Earth Ecuador, who led the case against Chevron, one of the largest legal environmental battles in history.

Related audio from Mongabay’s podcast: Award-winning climate fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson discusses how his classic “The Ministry for the Future” holds lessons for anyone grappling with present climate trends and seeking an optimistic view of climate action, listen here:

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