Energy giants TotalEnergies and Chevron Corp have said
they are exiting Myanmar due to the “worsening” human rights situation and
deteriorating rule of law after the country’s military seized power in a coup
last year.
The announcement on Friday followed a call by France’s Total a day earlier to slap targeted international sanctions on Myanmar’s oil and gas sector to place all revenues in escrow – a move aimed at cutting off the army’s biggest source of foreign currency funding after it overthrew Myanmar’s elected government in February 2021.
Total, Chevron and other firms were part of a joint
venture running the offshore Yadana gasfield and the MGTC transportation system
that carries gas from the field to Myanmar’s border with Thailand.
“While our Company considers that its presence in a
country allows it to promote its values, including outside its direct sphere of
operations, the situation, in terms of human rights and more generally the rule
of law, which have kept worsening in Myanmar since the coup of February 2021,
has led us to reassess the situation and no longer allows TotalEnergies to make
a sufficiently positive contribution in the country,” Total said in a
statement.
The French energy giant added that it is withdrawing
from the joint ventures “without any financial compensation for TotalEnergies”.
Human rights campaigner Human Rights Watch applauded
Friday’s announcement, posting on Twitter: “Total’s welcome move reflects the
importance of avoiding complicity in the Myanmar junta’s atrocities. The next
step is to ensure that gas revenues don’t continue to fund those
atrocities."
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