A proposed offshore oil project near the Falkland Islands threatens sensitive marine ecosystems—and Argentina’s sovereignty—and must be halted, an Argentine environmental group and a veterans’ organization alleged in a new lawsuit.
The complaint, filed in a federal Argentine court on Tuesday, asks the court to block planned offshore oil operations by U.K.-based Rockhopper Exploration and Navitas Petroleum of Israel on the Argentine continental shelf, about 136 miles north of the Falkland Islands, which Argentina calls the Malvinas Islands, or Islas Malvinas.
The plaintiffs—the Argentine Association of Environmental Lawyers and the Malvinas Islands La Plata Ex-Combatants Center—argue that the Sea Lion oil and gas project is being developed without an environmental impact assessment or environmental authorization from Argentina.
“Licenses from the British colonial administration do not replace our laws nor allow lawful disposal of the natural assets of the Argentine continental shelf,” the plaintiffs said in a press release.
The government of the Falkland Islands, a British overseas territory, announced in December that it had approved the project. That government’s Department of Mineral Resources did not respond to a request for comment.
