KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — Uganda's leader warned Friday that his government could “find someone else to work with” as French partner TotalEnergies faced mounting pressure to pull out of a partnership to construct a pipeline opposed by climate activists.
The comments by Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni followed a resolution by the European Union's Parliament urging the international community “to exert maximum pressure on Ugandan and Tanzanian authorities, as well as the project promoters and stakeholders," to stop oil activities around Lake Albert.
That resolution cited human rights concerns centered around fair compensation for affected communities as well as environmental fears. More than 120,000 people will lose land to make way for the oil project, according to an evaluation by the environmental group Friends of the Earth.
The 897-mile (1,443-kilometer) East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline, planned by TotalEnergies and the China National Offshore Oil Corporation, is increasingly in trouble as activists, charging that it violates the spirit of the Paris climate accord, try to starve it of funds by petitioning banks and insurers.
But in Uganda, an East African country whose authorities see the pipeline as key to economic development, opposition to the project has sparked indignation. Ugandan authorities say oil wealth can lift millions out of poverty and that stopping the pipeline now would be detrimental to the country's interests.
The national assembly issued a statement Thursday asserting Uganda's sovereignty and condemning the EU parliament's resolution.
Museveni said TotalEnergies had assured him that the pipeline — which would link oil fields in western Uganda to the Indian Ocean port of Tanga in Tanzania — would proceed but warned on Twitter that “if they choose to...
