A French civil court on Tuesday dismissed a fast-track lawsuit brought by campaigners against energy major TotalEnergies over its oil projects in Uganda and Tanzania, saying the case should be examined in depth in a standard trial, reports Yahoo! News.
Under the suit filed in 2019, six French and Ugandan activist groups had accused the company of failing to protect people and the environment from the Tilenga oil development and the $3.5 billion East African Crude Oil Pipeline.
The campaigners wanted the court to order TotalEnergies to halt the east African projects, basing their case on a 2017 "duty of vigilance" French law that requires companies to identify human rights and environmental risks in their global operations and supply chains, and take measures to prevent them.
The Paris civil court dismissed the request, saying that only a judge examining the case more in depth could assess whether the accusations against TotalEnergies were founded, and then proceed to an audit of operations on the ground.
Read more of this report from Yahoo! News.
See also Mediapart's story on the background to the oil projects:
Macron's discreet support for climate-harming oil project in Uganda