Nigerian gunmen abduct Filipino worker
Source: Reuters
(Adds details from new sources) By Austin Ekeinde PORT HARCOURT, Nigeria, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Nigerian gunmen abducted a Filipino oil contractor and killed at least one policeman escorting him on the road to Port Harcourt in the oil-producing Niger Delta on Tuesday, industry sources said. The Philippines has ordered the labour department to block workers from going to Nigeria after 24 Filipino seamen were captured on Jan. 20 in the delta, where kidnappings for ransom are an almost daily event. The seamen are still in captivity. "One Filipino was abducted this morning close to Owerri airport on the road to Port Harcourt. Gunmen in a van blocked the expat, who had a mobile policeman in his car. They shot and killed the policeman and abducted the expat," said a security expert working for an oil major. One other security expert from a different firm said two policemen were killed in the attack. A source at Royal Dutch Shell <RDSa.L> said the Filipino was working for a Shell contractor, Netcodietsmann, an oil services company that is a joint venture between the Nigerian state oil firm and a Monaco-based company. The Shell source said he was not sure if any policeman had been killed. Port Harcourt airport has been closed since last August so people travelling to the city by air fly to Owerri and drive from there. The drive takes two to three hours and most foreigners take a police escort. Violence surged in the Niger Delta last year and it has worsened since the start of 2007. Tuesday's abduction brings to 30 the number of foreigners being held by different armed groups across the delta. Some groups say they have political demands such as the release of jailed leaders from the delta or greater local control over oil wealth, but most abductions are resolved by the payment of ransoms. Copy-cat abductions have multiplied as kidnappers have made money from them. A fifth of oil production capacity from Nigeria, the world's eighth-biggest exporter of crude, has been shut down for a year because of militant attacks on oil facilities. The government is worried about instability in the delta in the build-up to landmark elections in April and about the security and economic impacts. Oil workers' unions have talked about a strike over insecurity and President Olusegun Obasanjo was due to meet union leaders on Tuesday to avert a strike. Poverty and a complete breakdown in social services due to rampant corruption among government officials have contributed to the spiralling violence in the Niger Delta. Residents resent the oil industry which has enriched foreign firms and faraway central governments that have neglected the delta. Oil workers and facilities have been targets for years, but now the violence has become indiscriminate. Foreign telecoms and construction workers as well as seamen have been targeted. The 24 Filipinos were seized from a German-operated cargo ship on a river in the western delta. (Additional reporting by Tom Ashby and Estelle Shirbon in Abuja)
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