Shell = Guilty

UPDATE: Victory! Shell Forced to Settle Human Rights Case Out of Court. Landmark Case Resolved in Favor of Plaintiffs as Shell Pays $15.5 Million USD, Including $5 Million Trust to Benefit Ogoni People and Their Communities. Read our press release.

Soon, multinational oil giant Shell will stand trial in United States federal court to answer to charges that it conspired in horrific human rights abuses in Nigeria in the 1990s.

The lawsuit, Wiwa v. Shell, charges Shell with requesting, financing, and assisting the Nigerian military which used deadly force to repress opposition to Shell’s operations in the Ogoni region of the Niger Delta. The lawsuit also charges Shell with conspiring with the Nigerian military dictatorship in the prosecution of the leaders of this movement – the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP). Shell bribed witnesses to give false testimony, ultimately leading to a death sentence for nine men, including acclaimed author, activist, and leader of MOSOP Ken Saro-Wiwa. On November 10th, 1995, Saro-Wiwa and eight other Ogoni leaders were hanged.

But Shell’s crimes didn’t end there.

For over fifty years, Shell’s operations in the Niger Delta have caused environmental devastation and human suffering. And for fifty years, the associated gas produced with Nigeria’s oil has been burned off in huge roaring flares rather than being either re-injected or used commercially. This gas flaring poisons the land and air with a toxic cocktail of pollutants, including sulphur and nitrogen dioxides, benzene, xylene and dioxins. Devastating to the local environment and to the health of surrounding communities, Shell’s gas flaring was one of the abuses that Ken Saro-Wiwa and many other Ogoni people died seeking to end.

Shell’s gas flaring in Nigeria is a climate crime too. Gas flaring in Nigeria emits more greenhouse gases in sub-Saharan Africa than all other sources combined. In addition to harming the local environment and human health in Nigeria, Shell’s gas flaring is significantly contributing to global warming, adding to the peril the planet faces.

Shell must come clean:

• Stop gas flaring in Nigeria, a practice devastating to the environment and human health, and a significant contributor to global warming.

• Disclose its role in the abuses committed against the Ogoni people in Nigeria, including the execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni 9.

ShellGuilty is a coalition initiative of Friends of the Earth, Oil Change International, and Platform/Remember Saro-Wiwa