Nigerian troops battle gangs in oil city

By Staff
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Google Oneindia News

PORT HARCOURT, Nigeria, Aug 16 (Reuters) Nigerian troops fought gun battles with gangsters in the oil city of Port Harcourt today, killing several people, army and private security sources said.

The army used rockets and machine guns in dawn raids on criminal hide-outs after six days of street battles between rival gangs last week. The gangs responded by invading five districts across the city, including the area around the state government headquarters.

''The military suffered several fatalities after the initial encounter and have resorted to the use of choppers and gun boats,'' said a private security source, who is not allowed to talk to the media.

Sagir Musa, spokesman for the military task force in the oil producing Niger Delta, said troops killed some suspected ''bad boys'' and arrested others, but declined to give figures.

A resident of the old district of Borokiri said he heard intense automatic gunfire all morning.

''A group of men drove past my house waving guns and blood-stained knives while a helicopter gunship hovered overhead shooting,'' he said.

Before nightfall, the gunmen retreated back into the creeks around the city, which is home to Royal Dutch Shell among other big energy companies.

Rival gangs fought street battles for six days last week in a turf war that killed at least a dozen people and shut down most commercial activity in the sprawling, industrial city.

Violence in Nigeria's oil heartland surged early last year when armed groups protesting against neglect and corruption in the impoverished delta started blowing up pipelines and oil wells and kidnapping foreign oil workers.

CRIME WAVE The attacks shut at least a fifth of oil output in Nigeria, the world's eighth biggest exporter, prompting thousands of foreign workers to flee and lifting world oil prices.

But the violence shifted from targeted attacks on the oil industry into a crime wave. Hundreds of kidnappings for ransom have taken place as have armed robberies and deadly gang wars.

Aid group Doctors Without Borders said its Port Harcourt trauma centre admitted 71 gunshot victims in two weeks.

The army has blamed two rival militia leaders, Ateke Tom and Soboma George, for the fighting.

But human rights activists have said that like many militias in the delta, these men were at various times sponsored by politicians who used them to rig elections or scare opponents.

Activists say politicians' use of unemployed youths as hired thugs is one of the factors behind rising violence in the delta.

Tom and George used to be part of the same group until they fell out and George joined a faction of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), one of the more active rebel groups in the delta.

MEND said in an e-mail to Reuters that George escaped ''alive and well'' from an attack on his hotel today, but several aides were killed by troops firing rockets and machine guns.

The group threatened reprisal attacks from midnight unless the government halted the military operations.

REUTERS SBC RN2315

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