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U.S.-based
oil firm Exxon Mobil was ordered by a court in Nigeria
to pay almost $10 million in damages to three Niger
Delta communities for a 1998 oil spill, Nigerian
officials said yesterday.
In
a judgment handed down Friday, Justice Abdullahi
Mustapha of Lagos' Federal High Court said the spill
of between 40,000 and 100,000 barrels of crude oil
into the region's river and
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marshlands
caused by a rupture to an Exxon pipeline had resulted
in environmental damage to the nearby villages of Bonny,
Brass and Andoni.
In a statement yesterday that announced Exxon's intention
to appeal, company spokesman Udom Inoyo said the company
had closely monitored the effects of the spill and that
"there was no discernible adverse effect on the people
and the environment."
Nigeria
is the fifth-largest source of U.S. oil imports and Exxon
pumps about 800,000 barrels per day, much of it from the
Niger Delta region (CNN.com, Dec. 8).
According
to Integrated Regional Information Networks, relations
between oil firms and local towns are often tense, and
impoverished communities have accused the joint ventures
by foreign companies and the government of cheating them
out of wealth and harming the environment (IRIN, Dec.
8).
Copyright, National Journal Group, Year.
