Re: TNC's 2 - Shell - Brit/Dutch

["Bryan A. Alexander" <bnalexan@xxxxxxxxx>]

Curious: the World Bank opposing Shell...



Bryan Alexander
Department of English
University of Michigan
**********************

On Fri, 25 Aug 1995, Chris Burford wrote:

>
> >From Chris B:
>
> And also from yesterday's Guardian, London, on TNC's -
> a letter from Nobel prize winner Ken Saro-Wiwa, smuggled
> out of prison in Nigeria: -
>
>
> "At the root of my travails is Shell, which has exploited,
> traduced and driven the Ogoni people to extinction in the last
> three decades. The company has taken over $30 billion out of
> Ogoni and has left a completely devastated environment and a
> trail of human misery.
>
> When I organised the Ogoni people to protest against Shell's
> ecological war, the company invited the Nigerian military
> to intervene. Lethal arms supplied by the British government
> were used on unarmed Ogoni people while they were sleeping
> in their beds. Thousands have been murdered, hundreds of
> thousands driven into the bush and tens of villages
> flattened.
>
> ...
>
> The World Bank, after studying the Niger delta, has warned
> that 'an urgent need exists to implement mechanisms to protect
> the life and health of the region's inhabitants and its
> ecological systems from further deterioration'. Shell has not
> faced the consequences of its ecological war on the delta.
> Given the brutal nature of the military dictatorship, there is
> little doubt that it will send me to the gallows or have me shut up
> as long as possible.
>
> I have one suggestion for those whose conscience has been
> disturbed by my story: boycott all Shell products. Picket
> Shell garages. Do not allow them to profit by their destruction
> of the people and ecology of the Niger delta.
>
> And please do not allow the kangaroo military tribunal which is
> supposedly trying me to condemn me to death for a crime I know
> nothing about; make appeals to a military dictatorship
> which has neither legitimacy, nor conscience.
>
> Support the call for a world wide boycott of Nigerian oil. Help
> save life and the environment of the Niger delta."
>
> Ken Saro-Wiwa.
> c/o box 639, Port Harcourt, Nigeria.   "
>
>
>
>
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>


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