Villagers in the Indonesian province of Aceh sued ExxonMobil for decades, alleging that the company’s hired troops guarding a natural gas project in the area committed murder and torture. It was announced in a joint filing made on Monday that “all matters” had been settled between the two parties. The settlement terms are private, according to the villagers’ attorney Agnieszka Fryszman. According to an ExxonMobil representative, the agreement “brings closure for all parties.”
The lawsuit was filed in 2001 by eleven Acehnese peasants who claimed to be victims of human rights violations at the hands of Indonesian military stationed in the city of Lhoksukon from 1999 to 2003. Sexual assault, violence, and illegal imprisonment were all named as possible causes. On May 24 in Washington, DC, a trial was set to begin to determine whether or not the corporation was responsible in contracting the Indonesian troops. ExxonMobil has denied any knowledge of human rights abuses and said it was not accountable for any wrongdoings that could have occurred because it did not command or sanction them. At the time of the alleged atrocities, thousands of Indonesian troops were stationed in the region to put down a protracted insurrection by independence rebels. At least 170,000 people in Aceh, on the northern tip of Sumatra island, were killed by the Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004, prompting the region’s leaders to finally reach a peace pact. Fryszman, an attorney with Cohen Milstein, stated, “Our clients… bravely took on one of the largest and most profitable corporations in the world and stuck with the fight for more than 20 years.” As the trial was about to begin, “we are so pleased that now, on the eve of trial, we were able to secure a measure of justice for them and their families.”
The plaintiffs had stayed nameless “in the face of grave threats to themselves and their fellow villagers,” the legal firm noted in a news release, and they were so overcome with emotion during the settlement that they broke down in tears. A representative for ExxonMobil told the AFP news agency that the corporation “condemns human rights violations in any form,” which includes the conduct stated in this lawsuit against the Indonesian military.
