A Burmese woman, who was beaten and thrown with her baby into a fire by regime forces who sought to relocate her to a forcible labor camp set up to build a pipeline, filed suit in U.S. court against Unocal in 1994. The Burmese dictatorship, in order to provide cheap labor for the Unocal pipeline project, ordered the relocation of the plaintiff's entire village, committing them to forced labor to fulfill the pipeline contract.

In 1997, a U.S. court ruled that U.S. corporations and executives can be held liable for participating in, ignoring or creating circumstances where individuals in foreign countries are subjected to brutal violations of international human rights laws. The court specifically found that:

Unocal knew that the military had a record of committing human rights abuses; that the Project hired the military to provide security for the Project, a military that forced villagers to work and entire villages to relocate for the benefit of the Project; that the military, while forcing villagers to work and relocate, committed numerous acts of violence; and that Unocal knew or should have known that the military did commit, was committing and would continue to commit these tortious acts.