Nigeria’s State Oil Corporation Paid Militants $12Million

The Nigerian government’s main oil agency has admitted that it paid militants in the oil-rich Niger Delta $12 million as “protection fees”. The chief executive of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Abubakar Yar'Adua, told a parliamentary hearing Tuesday that NNPC paid the amount in two installments so that the militants could allow them repair a damaged pipeline. The main militant group in the Delta, MEND, has however threatened to destroy the country's major oil pipelines in response to the allegation, which it insists is false. [PE]