Nigerian Government Urged to End Conflict by International Crisis Group

The International Crisis Group, an independent, nonprofit, nongovernmental organization that works to resolve and prevent violent conflict around the world, has published a new brief arguing that Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua must take decisive action to prevent the spread of violence in the Niger Delta. The report, published December 5 and available on the Crisis Group's web site, is titled "Nigeria's President Must Act Now to End Delta Unrest."

The new report takes a look at the measures required to solve the core issues contributing to violence in the region, which is flush with oil resources, and to keep the Niger Delta from experiencing an increase in levels of violence. Despite a truce by armed factions and the installation of new governments at the federal and state levels, the Crisis Group says that militant groups are increasing their attacks on oil facilities and that criminal elements are once again committing increasing numbers of kidnappings.

Nnamdi Obasi, a senior analyst for the Crisis Group, says, "Hostage taking has turned into a lucrative, criminally driven enterprise. This practice is threatening to spread beyond the core Niger Delta to other parts of the country."

After his election, the report says, President Yar'Adua began negotiating with opposition groups and supported the previous president's program for development in the Niger Delta region. Since then, the Crisis Group says, the armed group Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) has once again begun to strike the country's oil facilities and take hostages. MEND returned to violence because of the continuing failure of the Nigerian government to address core issues of the conflict. Renewed violence could become more severe, the report says if current divisions among the region's armed groups continue to increase. The current state of affairs has already been made worse due to battles between criminal elements in the region, according to the Crisis Group.