Amazon Watch an earlier court's dismissal on the basis of "forum non conveniens." Thus, legal proceedings were started in Ecuador in 2003. Amazon Watch supports the Ecuadorian plaintiffs by publishing a press kit alleging that Chevron (corporate successor to Texaco) should be held accountable for the dumping of of toxic waste water into a region of Ecuador's Amazon rainforest inhabited by more than 30,000 people – purported to be one of the largest oil related contaminations ever, far exceeding that of the Exxon Valdez disaster. A 2011 decision in Ecuador ordered Chevron to pay $9.5 billion. Ecuador's Supreme Court in 2013 affirmed
China–Ecuador relations Development Bank signed on the same day has an identical clause. China has also tried to secure its loans by pushing for a massive expansion of Ecuador’s oil frontier, especially in the central-south Amazon and Yasuní National Park, before and after the Yasuní-ITT Initiative failed. The Yasuní-ITT Initiative was the proposal by the government of Ecuador to refrain indefinitely from exploiting the oil reserves of the Ishpingo-Tambococha-Tiputini (ITT) oil field in the Yasuní National Park, in exchange for half of the value of the reserves, or $3.6 billion over 13 years from the international community. The aim of the initiative