A Buenos Aires court has ordered an investigation be opened on the Chevron-YPF deal for the exploitation of the Vaca Muerta oil field, which would involve president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner.
The court must determine whether the president acted illegally when she signed a decree in 2013 which awarded certain benefits to oil companies with large investment projects in the country, right before YPF signed the Vaca Muerta agreement with Chevron.
The president was sued last year by representatives from political party Nueva Izquierda for abuse of power, breach of duty, and attempted environmental damage. Though the prosecutor had ruled that the lawsuit be dismissed, judge María Servini de Cubría annulled the ruling and gave the investigation the go-ahead.
The basis for the lawsuit is that “[decree 929/2013], simultaneous to the agreement signed between YPF and multinational company Chevron (ex Standard Oil), has been sanctioned with the clear intention of benefiting said North American oil company in the hydrocarbon exploitation in the Vaca Muerta oil field.”
The government, through Chief of Cabinet Jorge Capitanich, said that the lawsuit “has a clear and manifest political intention” and that “this type of actions don’t come from nowhere, and in Argentina there are internal and external agents that hope to affect the country’s strategic interests with these court actions.”
“The negotiation systems are clear and transparent, based on the uses of local legislation and compliant with the constitution and the law,” added Capitanich.
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