The Baku Ceyhan Campaign is working to raise public awareness of the social problems, human rights abuses and environmental damage that is being caused by the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline, which runs through Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey. In particular, the campaign argues that public money should not be used to subsidise social and environmental problems, purely in the interests of the private sector, but must be conditional on a positive contribution to the economic and social development of people in the region.
BP [along with other oil companies] is currently building a new pipeline system due to be completed in the latter half of 2005, that runs from the offshore oil fields of Azerbaijan in the Caspian Sea, to the southern shores of Turkey on the Mediterranean via Georgia.
Starting just near Baku in Azerbaijan, running close to Tbilisi in Georgia, and finishing south of Ceyhan in Turkey, it is known as the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan [BTC] pipeline.
The project is subsidised by British public money, through the Export Credit Guarantee Department and other financial institutions.
The Baku Ceyhan campaign is actively monitoring the project both to support communities affected by the pipeline and to hold to account the institutions which are financing the project.