Supporting Organizations
The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), Earthrights International (ERI) and private human rights attorneys are counsel on this landmark lawsuit.
The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Founded in 1966 by attorneys who represented civil rights movements in the South, CCR is a non-profit legal and educational organization committed to the creative use of law as a positive force for social change.
CCR uses litigation proactively to advance the law in a positive direction, to empower poor communities and communities of color, to guarantee the rights of those with the fewest protections and least access to legal resources, to train the next generation of constitutional and human rights attorneys, and to strengthen the broader movement for constitutional and human rights. CCR’s work began on behalf of civil rights activists, and over the last four decades CCR has lent its expertise and support to virtually every popular movement for social justice.
Click here to visit the website of the Center for Constitutional Rights
EarthRights International (ERI) is a nongovernmental, nonprofit organization that combines the power of law and the power of people in defense of earth rights. ERI specializes in fact-finding, legal actions against perpetrators of earth rights abuses, training grassroots and community leaders, and advocacy campaigns. Through these strategies, ERI seeks to end earth rights abuses, to provide real solutions for real people, and to promote and protect human rights and the environment in the communities where ERI works.
Click here to visit the website of EarthRights International
Human rights litigation by CCR and ERI has helped paved the way for the modern use of the Alien Tort Statute. Over the past decade, litigation by CCR and ERI has successfully expanded the application of the ATS to cases involving human rights violations committed directly by or with the complicity of multinational corporations and their officials.
As co-counsel in a human rights lawsuit against Unocal corporation (Doe v. Unocal) CCR and ERI won a significant victory on behalf of the victims of forced labor, rape and murder committed as part of a natural gas pipeline project in Burma.
On November 10, 1995, Ken Saro-Wiwa, an acclaimed writer and leader of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), was hanged along with eight other Ogoni leaders, after a trial before a military tribunal that was condemned around the world as a sham. Ken Saro-Wiwa's last words were: "Lord take my soul but the struggle continues."