U.S. Agency Makes First Step in Committing to an Independent Review of its Role in Human Rights Abuses in Liberia

Today, the U.S. Overseas Private Investment Corporation (“OPIC”) committed for the first time to conducting an independent review of the impacts of its investment in an abusive biomass project in Liberia. On January 22, 2014, hundreds of Liberian farmers, charcoal producers and workers filed a complaint with OPIC demanding redress for its funding of a the project, operated by Buchanan Renewables, which caused serious human rights, labor and environmental abuses, including sexual abuse by company employees of local women

Read full press release here.