Veolia

Summary

French conglomerate, a partner with Alstom in the consortium contracted to build and manage the Jerusalem Light Rail, and the main target of the Derail Veolia campaign documented in Chapter 11 of Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions: The Global Struggle for Palestinian Rights, PDF p.154-164).

Details

• Veolia and Alstom were sued at Nanterre in 2007 by the PLO and the Association France-Palestine Solidarité over the light rail contract; in April 2009 the court declared jurisdiction and ruled Israel could not claim sovereign standing over contracts in territory it occupies (PDF p.154-155).
• The Introduction records the Derail Veolia/Alstom campaign, launched in November 2008 in Bilbao, and that “Veolia in particular has lost contracts worth billions of dollars” (PDF p.38-39). Chapter 11, however, dates the Bilbao conference that made the campaign a priority to October 2008 (PDF p.155); the conflict between the Introduction’s November 2008 launch date and Chapter 11’s October 2008 conference date is recorded under Open questions on the source page.
• ASN Bank in the Netherlands divested from Veolia Transport in November 2006; Stockholm’s council announced Veolia, operator of the county metro for ten years, had lost the contract for the next eight years, worth 3.5 billion euros (approximately $4.5billion);SandwellCouncildroppeditsbidforawastecontractworthabout$1.5 billion over twenty years; Bordeaux awarded a $1 billion contract to its competitor; Dublin City Council resolved on May 10, 2010 not to sign or renew its contracts, and Swansea Council voted on June 17, 2010 to exclude it from municipal contracts (PDF p.157-159, p.163-164). The councils are recorded as insisting the decisions were commercial.
• Haaretz reported Veolia “abandoning” the light rail and “trying to sell its 5% stake in Citypass, the light rail consortium”, with “political pressure” and lost European projects as the “real reason”; Veolia could reportedly not sell its share and ran a survey of East Jerusalem Palestinians that was described as racist even by members of the Israeli government (PDF p.160-161).
• Veolia Transport operates the gender-segregated bus service 322 from Tel Aviv to Ashdod, confirmed to Who Profits from the Occupation? (PDF p.162-163). The campaign against it continues over its settlement bus services and the Tovlan landfill in the occupied Jordan Valley (PDF p.164).

Related pages

Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions: The Global Struggle for Palestinian Rights, Alstom, Jerusalem Light Rail, BDS movement, BDS National Committee