One of the largest environmental legal cases in UK legal history begins in London on Wednesday 15th October 2014 as Colombian farmers bring their legal fight against BP to the High Court. The…trial will be the first time BP have faced the UK Courts over their business actions overseas and the first time compensation for environmental damage to privately owned land, caused by a UK oil company, has been litigated in…UK courts. A…judge will be asked to assess whether BP breached agreements with Colombian farmers and were negligent in causing environmental damage to their farmlands due to the construction of the OCENSA oil pipeline across their private properties in the mid 1990s. Lawyers for the 73 mostly subsistence farmers…will argue that the British company Equion Energia…negligently managed the construction of the OCENSA oil pipeline causing serious damage to their land…Some farmers say sedimentation of wells meant they did not have a source of drinking water for some time...The claims will be argued with reference to contractual and extra contractual liability under Colombian law...