Fighting raged today in the south Nigerian city of Warri, marking some of the fiercest ethnic clashes since a March rebellion forced oil firms to quit key installations in the world's eighth-largest crude exporter.
The fighting erupted last night and continued today in the oil-rich Niger Delta, a local official of a non-governmental organisation said. Dozens died in the March rebellion by ethnic Ijaws.
The Ijaws rebellion five months ago forced oil majors Shell , ChevronTexaco and Total to evacuate installations and shut off around 40 per cent of Nigeria's oil production.
The conflict in the Niger Delta is essentially over land and political power, but has been exacerbated by fierce competition over oil riches since an oil-boom began in the 1970s.
Witnesses said the latest fighting in the Niger Delta followed an attack on the village of Ode-Itsekiri on Thursday, in which four people were reported killed and 15 missing. Ode-Itsekiri is the traditional homeland of the Itsekiris.
Fighting in the Niger Delta between Ijaws and Itsekiris resumed in mid-July after a lull following the March rebellion, with Itsekiris apparently better armed and more capable of launching revenge attacks.
NGOs in the area say that funds from the large-scale theft of crude oil are being used to bring small arms into the area. Between 200,000 and 300,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude is estimated to be stolen by criminal gangs who break into pipelines and then sell the oil on the international market.
Oil majors estimate that facilities which have been abandoned since March account for a further 272,500 bpd, making the unrest in the Niger Delta a strong threat to their business in the OPEC member nation.