Militants launch oil attacks

2008-09-15 13:49

Lagos - Gunmen battled government forces on Monday in a third day of violence to hit Nigeria's southern oil region after the main militant group declared a state of war and raised the spectre of a stepped-up conflict in Africa's oil giant.

Fighters riding in about 10 speedboats attacked security personnel guarding an oil-pumping station operated by Royal Dutch Shell PLC in a pre-dawn raid, touching off an hour long battle, said Sagir Musa, a spokesperson for the military in the southern Niger Delta region.

Musa said the so-called flow station may have been damaged during the battle, but that no government forces were injured. Shell officials couldn't immediately be reached for comment.

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, the region's main militant group, had no immediate comment on any involvement. The group has mostly focused on hobbling Nigeria's oil industry since it emerged nearly three years ago, bombing pipelines in hopes of forcing the federal government to send more revenues to the impoverished oil-producing south.

But a military task force involving marine, land and air forces has stepped up its anti-militant activities in recent weeks, and the militant group said on Sunday that two days of relatively rare ground battles with the military meant the region was in a state of war.

"Following a previous warning that any attack on our positions will be tantamount to a declaration of a oil war, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta has declared an oil war," said a statement from the group, known by its acronym Mend.

Robust attacks

It was unclear if the declaration would have any real effect on the ground in the Niger Delta. Neither side has sought a full-blown civil war, although Nigerian media have reported that some elements in the military were pushing for more-robust attacks on the militants.

Mend is a loose alliance of militant and criminal gangs who steal Nigerian oil for sale overseas. Most fighting is focused on hitting the oil industry, but a full-scale conflict with the military could leave the country's oil-pumping infrastructure in tatters, while jeopardising the militants' own lucrative oil trade.

International oil companies would struggle to maintain the thousands of kilometres of pipelines connecting wells to export terminals. A shutdown of all oil production from Nigeria, one of the world's top producers and an Opec member, would cause further spikes in oil prices.

The militants, who analysts say are motivated by money as well as politics, say they want more federally held oil funds for their states, which remain impoverished despite five decades of production in Africa's oil giant. Their attacks have cut about one-fifth of Nigeria's normal oil output, helping send crude prices to all-time highs in international markets.

- SAPA