Ecuador ForMin, criticized for Amazon project, quits

Ecuadorean Foreign Affairs Minister Fander Falconi addresses the media during a news conference in Quito December 18, 2008.

QUITO (Reuters) - Ecuadorean Foreign Minister Fander Falconi stepped down Tuesday, a source at the ministry said, after President Rafael Correa criticized the way that Falconi was negotiating an Amazon rain forest protection project.

"He resigned this morning," said the source, who has direct knowledge of the situation and asked to remain anonymous.

Under Correa's Yasuni initiative, Ecuador would leave 850 million barrels of oil, worth $6 billion, underground in the country's Amazon region as a contribution to countering climate change.

In return for not exploiting the oil in the environmentally rich area, the OPEC-member country is looking to other countries to pay it $350 million a year.

Falconi headed the government's push to get international support for the initiative but Correa recently said the negotiations between Ecuador and potential donor nations were being handled "shamefully."

The president said the commission headed by Falconi was not negotiating toughly enough and that potential donors such as Germany and Belgium were attempting to dictate terms.

Not touching the oil would avoid creating 410 million tonnes of carbon dioxide, Ecuador says.

(Reporting by Alexandra Valencia, Editing by Sandra Maler)