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Daily
Telegraph: Ransom is not enough for Nigerian
kidnappers: Friday 20 Jan 2006
By Mike Pflanz in Nairobi
(Filed: 20/01/2006)
Nigerian militants holding a
British security expert and three other foreign
oil workers hostage have said ransom offers
would not sway them into releasing their
captives.
The four men, abducted from
a Royal Dutch Shell platform a week ago, would
walk free only if Nigeria's government released
two ethnic leaders charged with treason and
embezzlement, the group said yesterday.
The Movement for the
Emancipation of the Niger Delta also warned of
further attacks on petrochemical companies'
installations across the world's eighth largest
oil exporter.
Output has already been cut
by 10 per cent and global oil prices climbed to
a four-month high on Wednesday as markets
fretted about effects of the kidnappings.
The militants, from the
impoverished Ijaw tribe, are demanding control
of the Niger Delta's oil wealth, payment of $1.5
billion by Shell to the local Bayelsa state
government to compensate for pollution, and the
release of three men including two Ijaw leaders.
Reports indicate that the
Nigerian government and Shell wanted to pay for
the hostages to be released and for oil
operations to continue as normal.
The American oil worker
could be released on medical grounds if his
employer, US-based oil services firm Tidex,
agrees to send their managing director to take
his place, the kidnappers said.
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