TotalEnergies & Chevron are divesting – what does this mean?

Blood Money Campaign (BMC) x Global Myanmar Spring Revolution (GMSR) in collaboration Info Birmanie from France — will be holding the press conference on the topic above.

Human rights and democracy activists as well as civil society organisations around the world, especially the oppressed civilians inside Myanmar and Myanmar diaspora around the world have been calling on TotalEnergies and Chevron to stop funding gas revenue to the military junta and instead to transfer these foreign revenues into an escrow account. Now that TotalEnergies and Chevron announced that they will exit Myanmar in 6 months time, GMSRxBMC & Info Birmanie will hold a press conference addressing the potential consequences from their withdrawals.

Date:
27 January (Thursday)

Time:
France Standard Time 11 a.m. | Myanmar Standard Time 4:30 pm | California Standard Time: 2 a.m.

Moderation:
Debbie Stothard, founder of ALTSEAN Burma, Advocate & Trainer for Women’s Leadership, Business & Human Rights

Participants:

1. Sophie Brondel of Info Birmanie from France, former lawyer on International Human Rights Law, Criminal Law & Minority Rights,

2. Maw Tun Aung, Managing Director of Myanma Oil and Gas Enterprise of NUG Myanmar.

3. Ben Hardman, Lawyer, Myanmar Legal & Political Advisor, EarthRights International

4. Mulan, Youth Human Rights Activist, Campaigner for Blood Money Campaign & Women Activists Myanmar (WAM)

5. Ko Ye, Natural Resources, Mineral & Fossil Fuels Activists & Blood Money Campaign Activist.

Registration: bit.ly/TotalEnergiesPC2

Following the week of action in September coordinators of the Blood Money campaign decided to call for another week of action in October. This time with the focus on the oil and gas industry.

Global Call Theme
မြန်မာပြည်ကိုကယ်တင်ရေး စစ်ကောင်စီကိုငွေမပေး
Freeze Payments To Junta and Save Myanmar

#BloodMoneyMyanmar #FreezePaymentsToJunta #SanctionMOGE #Total_StopSponsoringSAC #Chevron_StopSponsoringSAC #BloodMoneyCampaignMM

Go to:
☆ What YOU can do! ☆ Why the oil and gas industry? ☆ Materials ☆ Social Media Campaign ☆
☆ Reports ☆ Joint Statement (BMC & Milk Tea Alliance) ☆

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What YOU can do!

• Organize actions at facilities owned by TotalEnergies or Chevron!
• Support theses petitions by signing and helping to spread them:
  TOTAL – Stop being an Accessory to Murder!
  Chevron – Stop Bankrolling the Myanmar Military!
  President Biden – Stop Oil Companies from Bankrolling the Myanmar Military!
  POSCO – Stop funding the Myanmar Military Junta!
• Send advocacy letters to CEOs and shareholders of TotalEnergies and Chevron! Download this pdf for details.
• Send letters to international government and EU councils to push for sanctions on MOGE!
• Reach out to media/press to inform about the Global Week of Action and encourage coverage.
• Social media: Use #BloodMoneyMyanmar and #BloodMoneyCampaignMM.
  Download this twitter package.
  Add this filter to your profile picture.
  
  SCROLL DOWN for more materials (incl. a leaflet).
  Announce your activities in advance and share your reports: bloodmoneycampaign21@gmail.com | asia@icl-cit.org

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Why the oil and gas industry?

Revenues from the oil and gas companies are flowing through the state-owned Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise (MOGE) on to the military. MOGE is effectively a department of the Ministry of Electricity and Energy (MOEE) and has entered four joint ventures for four different offshore gas projects: Yadana Project (operated by TotalEnergies and Chevron), Shwe Project (operated by POSCO International), Zawtika Project (operated by PTTEP), as well as the Yetagun Project (operated by Petronas – but currently production is halted). Approximately 80% of the gas is exported by pipeline to Thailand or China. MOGE acts as the revenue collector for the state’s royalties, profit share, and bonuses. Following the coup in February the military has control over all government bank accounts, including MOGE’s accounts.

According to the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) revenues and associated taxes from MOGE are the larges single source of foreign exchange available to the military. The oil and gas industry was forecasted to earn the MOGE revenues of about USD1.5 billion in 2020/2021 according to the Ministry of Planning, Finance and Industry.
Each investor in the joint venture also pays 25% of corporate income tax on their net profit.

The Yandana Project is the only project with contracts that are publicly available. MOGE in its role as a state enterprise entered into a Production Sharing Contract (PSC) with three “contractors”: TotalEnergies (31% ownership); Unocal, now Chevron (28% ownership), and PTTEP (26% ownership). MOGE participates in the PSC as a fourth contractor with 15% ownership. The gas is sold to PTT, the Thai state oil company and parent of PTTEP.

The gas produced is transported via a 63km onshore pipeline to the Thai border. The pipeline is managed by the Moattama Gas Transportation Company (MGTC), whose shareholding mirrors the joint venture participation under the PSC. In 2017-2018, MGTC paid taxes to the government and dividends to MOGE of USD141 million. Under the original agreement, these dividend payments can only be paid with the approval of PTTEP. TotalEnergies and Chevron and TotalEnergies is responsible for arranging payment of MGTC’s taxes. On 12th May 2021, shareholders of MGTC voted to suspend all cash distributions due to the unstable context in Myanmar.

TotalEnergies has an additional role as the “Operator” of the upstream production and the pipeline. This means that TotalEnergies is in charge of the day to day on site operations. It also facilitates the gas sales to PTT by submitting an invoice as a “representative” of the parties to the PSC.

According to TotalEnergies’s reports to the EITI, which is reproduced in the table below, the company appears to make revenue payments to MOGE in cash for cost recovery, MOGE’s profit share, the state profit share, and royalties.
TotalEnergies’s and MOGE’s Memorandum of Understanding states that, apart from the gas that is retained for domestic use, all MOGE entitlements under the PSC will be “‘taken ‘in cash’, i.e. paid to Myanmar and MOGE by the Foreign Participants in the Projects.” (earthrights.org, see section 4(d) of the Memorandum of Understanding)
This would suggest that at least TotalEnergies, if not also PTTEP and Chevron, are taking the gas, selling it and have cash liability to MOGE.

It is estimated that around 50% of Myanmar’s foreign exchange now come from gas revenues. These revenues are likely to be crucial to the military’s ability to import fuel, weapons and equipment and its attempts to overcome the Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM) and assert control of the state.

All supporters of the Blood Money Campaign should pressure the companies involved!

1. Stop all revenue flows from international companies to the illegal military junta!
2. Freeze all payments designated for the Government of Myanmar until democracy is restored in Myanmar (keep payments in Escrow Accounts)!
3. International governments – implement sanctions against MOGE, whose accounts are now under the control of the military junta!

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Social Media Campaign

A social media campaign can have a significant impact to pressure corporations like TotalEnergies and Chevron and involve them in diplomatic discussions.
Therefore we call on everybody to join from their social media accounts on October 30 and 31st. (Facebook + Twitter + Instagram):

• Take a picture with the “three finger salute sign” while you hold a paper displaying the three demands listed below. Then post it on your social media accounts.
• Wear black/white dress/shirt (or) paint red on white clothing to visualize blood stains; take photos and post them on social media.
• Make use of your own creativity (arts, videos, graphics, comics, cartoons, memes, etc) related to blood money campaign.

Here are the recommended demands to use in this protest:

Total, Chevron – Freeze all payments to Junta
Total, Chevron – Keep all payments in Escrow Account
International governments: Sanction MOGE

Make use of the following hashtags in your posts:

#FreezePaymentsToJunta #SanctionMOGE #BloodMoneyMyanmar #BloodMoneyCampaignMM #Total_StopSponsoringSAC #Chevron_StopSponsoringSAC #GMSRxBMC

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Materials

Go to:
☆ Audio message ☆ Leaflet ☆ Share pics ☆ Short presentations ☆
☆ Introduction (Chevron) ☆ Introduction (POSCO) ☆

Audio message

BMC Leaflet

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Share pics

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Short presentations:

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Introduction (Chevron)

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Introdution (POSCO)

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Joint Statement (BMC & Milk Tea Alliance)

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An online protest for the suspension of blood money to the Military Junta will be conducted from 25 Sept. to 30 Sept. on all social media platforms especially facebook and twitter.

The following activities are recommended to participate in this online protest:

• Posting the demands from Blood Money Campaign facebook page and/or using own statements relate to the campaign (see below)
• Posting photos with “Three Finger Salute Sign” together with the statements/demands (for examples see below)
• Wearing red dress/shirt (or) painting red on white clothing to visualize blood stains and take photos to post on social media
• Using own creatives (arts, graphics, comics, cartoons, memes, etc) related to blood money campaign.

Together with above activities, please also tag/mention the social media channels of @TotalEnergiesMyanmar on fb/ @TotalEnergies on twitter and @Chevron in your social media post.

Here are the recommended statements/demands to use in this protest:

• Total and Chevron Corporations are responsible for all war crimes in Myanmar.
• Total and Chevron, Stop accessories to murder.
• Total and Chevron – Freeze all payment to MOGE until the power is restored by civilian government, NUG.

Please also use the following hashtags in your posts as much as possible:

#BloodMoneyMyanmar | #FreezePaymentsToJunta | #Total_StopSponsoringSAC | #Chevron_StopSponsoringSAC | #SanctionMOGE | #StopFundingCrimesAgainstHumanity | #ဖက်ဆစ်စစ်တပ်အမြစ်ဖျက်ဖို့_သွေးစွန်းငွေဖြတ်တောက်စို့

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Some details on the involvement of TotalEnergies and Chevron can be found in the section of Blacklisted Companies.

Activists on the ground as well as the grassroot labour unions in the Federation of General Workers Myanmar (FGWM) have initiated the Blood Money Campaign. The campaign aims to pressure companies that keep doing business in Myanmar to freeze all payments there immediately in order to cut off financial resources for the military junta.

Every month a common day or week of action will be coordinated. The working group Asia of the International Confederation of Labour (ICL) together with the individuals and organisations who initiated the Blood Money Campaign and the IWW Ireland call on all emancipatory groups and organisations to join the Global Week of Action in September!

What you can do:

• Show your solidarity and support on social media with the hashtags #BloodMoneyMyanmar #StopPayingToJunta #FreezeDollarToJunta
• Plan direct actions in front of offices, branches and headquarters of companies active in Myanmar (e.g. Primark or Adidas stores, offices of Volkswagen or branches of DHL Deutsche Post Group). You will find a complete list and more material for a protest here). In line with the campaign theme of blood money, you can use visual elements like bloody dolls or hands soaked in red color to create a “shock effect”.
• Send a letter of protest to the corporations that continue to do business with the military.
• Support fundraiser such as We Resist – Burma: firefund.net/weresistburma

If you have questions or are planning actions, please let us know. Here you will find suggestions for flyer texts, sample letters of protest and image material.
Don’t forget to send a report of your activities: asia@icl-cit.org | bloodmoneycampaign21@gmail.com.

Show our comrades in Myanmar that they are not alone, show your worldwide solidarity!

#BloodMoneyMyanmar
#UnitedAgainstTheJunta

• Facebook

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A next open online meeting for common coordinations in October 2021 is scheduled for
Sept. 19th – 2:30 pm UTC – meet.jit.si/BMCnetworking !