This letter from Ecuador responds to the Tribunal's request for comments on Chevron's account of enforcement proceedings in Canada, Brazil, and Argentina related to the Lago Agrio judgment. Ecuador argues that the interim awards should be terminated because Chevron faces no imminent threat of irreparable harm, as Chevron claimed in 2012 to obtain the interim awards. Ecuador details the status and likely timelines of the pending enforcement actions, arguing that none will result in imminent asset seizures or irreparable harm to Chevron. Ecuador also notes that enforcement of the judgment is now legally impossible in the US, where Chevron apparently has direct assets. Therefore, Ecuador asserts, good cause exists to dissolve the interim awards.

1. August 1, 2017
Mr. V.V. Veeder, QC
Essex Court Chambers
24 Lincoln’s Inn Fields
London WC2A 3EG
United Kingdom
Prof. Vaughan Lowe, QC
Essex Court Chambers,
24 Lincoln’s Inn Fields
London WC2A 3EG
United Kingdom
Dr. Horacio Grigera Naón
5224 Elliott Road
Bethesda, Maryland 20816
USA
Mr. Martin Doe
Ms. Jessica Wells
Permanent Court of Arbitration
Peace Palace
Carnegieplein 2
2517 KJ The Hague
The Netherlands
Dear Members of the Tribunal,
In the Tribunal’s communication of 21 July 2017, the Tribunal requests Ecuador “to
comment on the account provided by the Claimants as a factual chronology of the progress to date
of the enforcement proceedings in Canada, Brazil and Argentina,” and further invited the parties
to address, “insofar as relevant to the Respondent’s current application … the decision of The
Hague Court of Appeal of 18 July 2017.”
Regarding the latter of the two points, Ecuador is currently evaluating whether to appeal
the 18 July 2017 decision to the Dutch Supreme Court. Given that Ecuador’s application to the
Tribunal to terminate or dissolve the interim award rests on the lack of current “urgency,” a matter
not before the Dutch courts, Ecuador does not find discussion of the recent court decision germane
and declines the Tribunal’s invitation to address it here. The parties have nonetheless provided an
agreed-upon translation of the Dutch court decision to the Tribunal for its review and
consideration, and Ecuador is prepared to address any aspect of the decision should the Tribunal
so require. Ecuador thus limits its discussion herein to the three pending enforcement actions.
To persuade the Tribunal to issue the (successive) interim award(s), in 2012 Claimants
asserted that in the absence of emergency relief by this Tribunal the Lago Agrio Plaintiffs were
poised to launch a “worldwide enforcement campaign”1
involving “potentially dozens of foreign
courts.”2
Relying on the Lago Agrio Plaintiffs’ public rhetoric, Claimants argued that Chevron
was facing the likelihood of “ex parte” seizures of operational assets (oil tankers, wells and
pipelines) with no opportunity to be heard. These resulting seizures, Claimants concluded, would
be devastating to Chevron. “Missing product deliveries as a result of … planned asset seizures”
1
Claimants’ letter to the Tribunal dated 2 February 2012 at 5.
2
Id. at 7 (emphasis added).

2. August 1, 2017
Page 2
of Chevron’s “oil tankers, wells or pipelines” would “damage Chevron’s business reputation as a
reliable supplier and harm the valuable customer goodwill Chevron has developed over the past
130 years.”3
Since the Lago Agrio Judgment became enforceable, not one single oil tanker, well or
pipeline has ever been seized. The extraordinary dangers Claimants once claimed were allegedly
imminent never materialized. The Lago Agrio Plaintiffs have brought just three enforcement
actions, all of which were initiated in or prior to 2012. Not a single enforcement action has been
launched since 2012. Additionally, Chevron continues to advise in its press releases and in its
shareholder communications that it faces no threat of serious harm.4
And as Respondent advised
in 2012 and noted again in its 12 July 2017 application, Claimants have never been able to identify
even a single jurisdiction in which it has assets where it would be denied an opportunity to be
heard in connection with any attempt to enforce the Lago Agrio Judgment.5
Claimants’ own chronology of these enforcement actions belies their 2012 claims and
instead confirms that Chevron does not confront any imminent threat of irreparable harm
warranting preservation of the interim awards.
As a preliminary matter, in Respondent’s letter to the Tribunal dated 12 July 2017, Ecuador
observed that “[e]nforcement of the Lago Agrio Judgment is now a legal impossibility in the
United States, i.e., the only jurisdiction where Chevron, the party defendant in those proceedings,
apparently has direct assets (that is, other than through subsidiaries).”6
Claimants dispute neither
proposition, thereby acknowledging that enforcement is a legal impossibility in the United States
and that Chevron has no direct assets in any jurisdiction. This is reason enough to terminate the
interim awards.
Nothing in the three pending enforcement actions, even by Chevron’s accounts, suggests a
different outcome:
Proceedings in Canada. As a preliminary matter, Chevron is fully participating in the
Canadian proceedings so there is no threat of the previously-predicted “ex parte seizures.” Further,
by Claimants’ own account, just this year the Canadian first-instance court “granted a motion for
summary judgment in favor of Chevron Canada Limited, finding that it is a separate entity from
Chevron, not a party to the Ecuadorian lawsuit, not a debtor to the Judgment, and, therefore,
dismissed from the case,” and further “dismissed [the Lago Agrio Plaintiffs’] motion to amend”
3
Id. (citing Ex. C-1039, Declaration of Rex Mitchell in Support of Chevron Corporation’s Motion for
Preliminary Injunction, Feb 15, 2011).
4
See Chevron Corp. v. Donziger, 833 F.3d 74 (2d Cir. 2016), cert. denied, No. 16-1178, 2017 WL 1198372
(U.S. June 19, 2017).
5
Respondent’s letter to the Tribunal dated 12 July 2017 at 3-4 (quoting Hr’g Tr., 11 Feb. 2012, at 198-
201).
6
Id. at 2.

3. August 1, 2017
Page 3
their statement of claim.7
In sum, the Canadian court has declined to enforce the Lago Agrio
Judgment.
As it stands, the Lago Agrio Plaintiffs are left appealing the dismissal to the second instance
court, with both parties having yet the further right to seek review of any adverse decision from
the second-instance court to the Canadian Supreme Court.8
Ecuador has been advised by its expert
that any decision by the Canadian Supreme Court would likely issue not before late 2019 or early
2020.
More importantly, even if the Lago Agrio Plaintiffs were to obtain a reversal of the first-
instance court decision, Chevron would then have the right to contest enforcement—back in the
first-instance court—based on its public policy defense. That proceeding would afford the parties
the further right to discovery and an eventual trial, with both parties retaining the right to appeal
to the appellate court and eventually, again, to the Canadian Supreme Court.9
In short, there will be no ex parte seizures of any oil tankers, vessels or wells in Canada.
And there is no threat of any final decision for many years to come.
Proceedings in Brazil. The Brazilian recognition action has had little activity. As
Claimants themselves reported more than two years ago “the Federal Prosecutor issued an opinion
(published on May 13, 2015) recommending that the [first instance court] not recognize the
Judgment … and concluding that recognizing the Judgment would be contrary to Brazilian public
order.”10
Based on our research, there has been a general lack of activity in the first instance court
ever since, and there is no reason to believe a decision is forthcoming imminently. More
importantly, however, even if the first instance court were ever to override the Federal Prosecutor’s
recommendation and recognize the Lago Agrio Judgment, Chevron would have two layers of
appellate review, with no final decision expected for several years.11
As is the case in Canada, there is absolutely no threat of any ex parte seizures. For that
matter, there is no threat of any final decision for years to come.12
To be clear, the pending
proceeding is focused only on the recognition of the Ecuadorian court judgment. Only if and after
that is obtained would the Lago Agrio Plaintiffs be in a position to bring a legal action to enforce
on the judgment, in which case Chevron would have the right to contest enforcement.13
7
Claimants’ letter to the Tribunal dated 19 July 2017 at 4.
8
R-443, Affidavit of George J. Pollack, at 21, 22, 19.
9
Id. at 19-22, 25, 36.
10
Claimants’ letter to the Tribunal dated 19 July 2017 at 5.
11
R-444, Affidavit of Uyeda and Dourado, at 17-24.
12
Id. at 22.
13
Id. at 19, 20, 28.

4. August 1, 2017
Page 4
Proceedings in Argentina. According to Claimants, as in Brazil, the Public Prosecutor
issued an opinion “recommending that [the Lago Agrio Judgment] should not be recognized, and
ratified that opinion on December 20, 2016.”14
Recognition proceedings are more than five years
old, and yet still remain before the first instance court. Moreover, even if the first instance court
were to override the recommendation by the Public Prosecutor and find in favor of the Lago Agrio
Plaintiffs, Chevron has the right to appeal both to the appellate court and to the Argentine Supreme
Court.15
No final decision is imminent by any measure.
More fundamentally, however, the Argentine Supreme Court has already established as
“an undisputed fact” that Chevron’s subsidiaries in Argentina are distinct legal entities, separate
and apart from Chevron and, critically, not a party defendant in the Lago Agrio Litigation (i.e., not
a judgment debtor).16
It is on this basis that the Argentine Supreme Court rejected and revoked an
attempt to secure the effective enforcement of the Lago Agrio Judgment by going after Chevron’s
subsidiaries in that jurisdiction.17
And it is on this same basis that attempts at enforcing the Lago
Agrio Judgment in Argentina are likely to follow the Canadian precedent, with the Argentine
Courts declining to enforce the Judgment against Chevron’s subsidiaries in that jurisdiction. At
the very least, and for present purposes, there is no threat—imminent or otherwise—of any ex
parte seizure in Argentina.
The lesson of the last five and a half years is that the feared enforcement actions never
materialized in either the volume (“potentially dozens”) or in the form (ex parte actions to seize
operational assets) hyperbolically predicted by Claimants. To the contrary, there exist only three
enforcement actions, each of which is proceeding at a deliberate pace consistent with the practice
and laws of each State, as Respondent represented and presumed in 2012.18
In their correspondence of 19 July 2017, Claimants cite to the Fourth Interim Award, in
which the Tribunal noted that it “bears much in mind that the amounts at stake are potentially huge
in these arbitration proceedings, measured in multiple billions of US dollars. For the Claimants,
that means that an award of damages expressed in tens of billions of US dollars could provide no
adequate remedy, if their full case were to prevail against the Respondent and if the Lago Agrio
Judgment were in the meantime enforced and executed.”19
But what is clear is that Claimants face no immediate urgency as it relates to an award
“expressed in the tens of billions of US dollars.” Putting aside that the entirety of the Lago Agrio
Judgment was slashed in half and is in toto under ten billion dollars, resolution of the pending
issues in the three pending recognition and enforcement actions remains many years away.
14
Claimants’ letter to the Tribunal dated 19 July 2017 at 5.
15
R-468, Declaration of Marcelo Rufino, at 30, 31.
16
C-1877, Argentine Supreme Court decision of June 4, 2013 at 3, 4.
17
Id.
18
Hr’g Tr., 11 Feb. 2012, at 198-201.
19
Claimants’ Letter to Tribunal (July 19, 2017) at 7 (quoting Fourth Interim Award at 83).

5. August 1, 2017
Page 5
Claimants’ 19 July 2017 response does not dispute this. More fundamentally, Claimants ignore
the very language it quotes in which the Tribunal expressed concern about the actual enforcement
of a multi-billion dollar judgment, and instead has been forced to rely on the more mundane cost
of defending at three enforcement actions, only one of which is even active in any form (Canada),
as its evidence of irreparable harm.20
It is difficult to fathom how the incurrence of litigation costs
can possibly constitute irreparable harm. It cannot. Nor was it the basis of this Tribunal’s interim
awards.
For its part, Ecuador has complied with every monetary award entered against it. In the
circumstances here, however, it had no means by which it could comply under its law. Just as the
United States Supreme Court found that the United States could not comply with the interim
measures imposed by the Avena tribunal, so too Ecuador had no choice but to defer to its Judiciary,
which twice found21
that Ecuador’s obligation under the Inter-American Convention on Human
Rights to provide a remedy to a prevailing plaintiff prevented its courts from indefinitely
suspending the judgment at issue here, i.e., a judgment requiring the defendant (Chevron) to
provide relief in the form of funds to remediate contamination that the court found posed a threat
to human health.22
Granting Ecuador’s request and, as a result, terminating the interim awards, would not
prejudice Claimants. They remain free to seek emergency relief if urgent and new circumstances
warrant and an imminent threat of irreparable harm actually emerges. At this point, however, any
threat posed to them is merely hypothetical and, to the extent real, remote.
In light of five and a half years of Chevron’s uninterrupted operations, Claimants are hard-
pressed now to seriously argue that any threat to its operations is real or genuine, or otherwise
20
Id. at 5 (noting desire to avoid “excessive costs” in defending enforcement action).
21
See R-398, Decision of Lago Agrio Court (Feb. 17, 2012) at 2, 4 (Court “concurs with Chevron Corp.’s
assertions regarding Ecuador’s obligations at the international level”; “this Chamber ratifies Ecuador’s
commitment with its international obligations, both at the investment and human rights levels, but according
to our analysis it is very clear that under the Vienna Convention and other international obligations, in case
of doubt on the application of a law, the latter, i.e. human rights, take precedence.”); R-399, Decision of
Lago Agrio Court, Mar. 1, 2012 at 1-3, 5-8 (“suspension of the right of the plaintiffs to enforce an
enforceable judgment would violate their right to judicial protection (Art. 25), or at least would render it
completely ineffective for this specific case. To comply with the Award would make it impossible for us to
act in compliance with our obligation to ‘ensure that the competent authority provided by the state legal
system decides on the rights of any person claiming such a remedy,’ […] Accordingly, this Court agrees
that the judicial protection necessarily includes the guarantee of enforcement of a judgment, the absence of
which would render it entirely ineffective. Therefore, we are certain that to proceed as Chevron requests
and as the Arbitral Panel orders would be a direct attempt by us, as administrators of justice, on this
guarantee to access to effective justice that all citizens of Ecuador have”).
22
See, e.g., C-931, Lago Agrio Judgment at 182 (noting need to provide for plaintiffs’ “most basic needs”);
183 (referring to “the individualized reparation of the health of the affected persons” and acknowledging
too that “measures can be ordered that equally tackle the problem in a general way”); 184 (“it has been
proven that a serious public health problem exists” for which a remedy must be fashioned.).

6. August 1, 2017
Page 6
passes the threshold from inchoate to concrete. Good cause exists to dissolve the interim awards
because time has established that the alleged urgent threat once advertised does not currently exist.
Respectfully submitted,
Blanca Gómez de la Torre
Procuraduría General del Estado
Eric W. Bloom
Winston & Strawn LLP
Eduardo Silva Romero
Dechert (Paris) LLP
Ricardo E. Ugarte
Winston & Strawn LLP