Militants attack Shell facility, seize South Korean oil workers

A militant group in Nigeria’s oil-producing Niger Delta claimed responsibility for kidnapping five South Koreans during an attack Wednesday on a gas plant operated by Royal Dutch Shell.

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) said in an emailed statement that several people were killed in the raid.

“A military houseboat used by soldiers and mobile policemen drafted for the security of this facility was initially attacked and captured after a fierce fire-fight,” MEND said. “Some occupants of this houseboat were killed in this fight, some jumped overboard and the rest fled into the surrounding bushes.”

Shell confirmed the attack and the abduction of the South Koreans but could not elaborate on potential casualties.

“There was indeed an attack and hostages were taken, but we don’t have details yet,” said a spokesman in the company’s Nigeria office.

MEND fighters stormed the facility in the Cawthorn Channel estuary south of the main oil industry centre of Port Harcourt after midnight. It was the latest in a series of attacks since the beginning of the year that have caused Nigerian oil exports to drop by more than 20 percent.

The hostages are employees of Daewoo Engineering and Korea Gas Corp. contracted by Shell for work on the gas plant.

Major Sagir Musa, the military spokesman in Port Harcourt, also confirmed the attack and abductions but he had no further details.

MEND said Wednesday’s attack was in direct response to a federal appeals court ruling on Tuesday in the capital, Abuja, which denied bail to the region’s best known militia leader, Mujahid Dokubo-Asari, who is facing trial on charges of treason. The presiding judge had refused bail demands, describing Dokubo-Asari as a security risk.

The group has repeatedly demanded the release of Dokubo-Asari since it announced its emergence in January following an attack on an offshore facility where it seized four foreign workers.

Dokubo-Asari, as leader of another militia group, the Niger Delta People’s Volunteer Force, has campaigned for control of the delta’s oil wealth by its impoverished inhabitants, a call also taken up by MEND.

More than a decade of restiveness in the oil region has seen the emergence of different armed groups in the region, many of whom attack oil facilities and abduct oil workers for ransom.

On Sunday, eight oil workers seized from an offshore oil-rig two days earlier were freed by their captors. They had been abducted to pressure their employer to give jobs and other development benefits to the local community.

dm/cs/ccr