Protesters pour trouble on Ecuador’s oil producers

When protesters in Ecuador’s eastern Amazon shut down the country’s two main oil pipelines, occupied a couple of pumping stations and kidnapped dozens of oil workers last month, many in the Andean country had a sense of d

Despite efforts by successive governments to diversify the economy, South America’s second biggest exporter of crude to the US has become increasingly dependent on oil exports. In 2005, they totalled $5.8bn (€5bn,