Gunmen who kidnapped nine South Korean workers in Nigeria’s oil-producing Niger Delta have contacted the South Korean government, an official in Seoul said on Thursday, but their motives were still unclear.
The gunmen, armed with dynamite, invaded Daewoo Engineering and Construction’s riverside oil services base on the outskirts of the southern Bayelsa state capital Yenagoa on Wednesday, kidnapping the South Koreans and one Nigerian.
”We are in touch with the kidnappers of the Daewoo employees,” Vice-Foreign Minister Kim Ho-young told reporters.
”The Daewoo workers are believed to be safe as far as what we’ve been able to confirm through various channels.”
But Kim declined to disclose the identity of the gunmen or say what their demands might be.
”We’ll have to wait for the results from the people who are meeting them,” he said.
Kim said on Wednesday a South Korean ambassador was on his way from Cote d’Ivoire to Nigeria to deal with the crisis.
Daewoo is working on a pipeline project in the delta, which accounts for all oil production from Opec member Nigeria, the world’s eighth-biggest exporter of crude. A fifth of Nigerian output capacity is shut down because of militant attacks.
The security situation in the volatile area is worsening. Abductions are frequent and Wednesday’s attack came less than a week after five Chinese telecom workers were kidnapped for ransom in another area of the delta.
Hostages are usually kept for a few days in remote settlements before being released unharmed after their employers or local authorities pay money.
However, one Nigerian and one Briton were killed last year in separate botched attempts by troops to free them, and employees of Italian oil firm Agip have been held hostage since December 7 by the rebel Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend).
The Mend group, which says it is fighting for local control of oil assets and reparations for neglect and pollution, told Reuters in an e-mail it was not involved in the attack on the Daewoo base and it had information suggesting the kidnappers wanted a ransom for the Koreans.
Crime flourishes in the delta, where residents complain of neglect and marginalisation and armed forces are unable to police thousands of remote waterways. Kidnappings for ransom as well as politically motivated attacks on the oil industry and theft of crude oil from barges or pipelines are common.
These problems have plagued the delta for years but they intensified in 2006 and many fear violence will further escalate in the build-up to the Nigerian elections in April as armed thugs sponsored by local politicians come back into action. – Reuters