Nigeria is ready to work with Equatorial Guinea to improve security in the oil-producing Gulf of Guinea, where militants, pirates and smugglers threaten offshore and coastal facilities, the Nigerian presidency said. Equatorial Guinea President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo held talks with his Nigerian counterpart Umaru Yar’Adua on Thursday during a brief visit to Africa’s biggest oil exporter, whose energy industry has been hit by militant attacks.
Violence in Nigeria’s southern Niger Delta has shut down a fifth of the country’s production capacity for the past two years, and heavily-armed militants travelling in fast launches have raided ships and rigs far out to sea in the Gulf of Guinea. Equatorial Guinea, sub-Saharan Africa’s No. 3 oil producer, is also worried about attacks on its offshore fields. Armed raiders in speedboats stormed two banks in the coastal city of Bata in December, grabbing cash and shooting passers-by.
“President Yar’Adua assured … President Mbasogo that Nigeria will respond positively to his request for more bilateral cooperation with Equatorial Guinea on security matters and in other areas,” Nigeria’s presidency said in a statement published on Friday.
Equatorial Guinea would send a ministerial delegation to Nigeria soon to follow up on the talks.
The statement said Yar’Adua renewed his calls for the urgent creation by regional states including Nigeria, Equatorial Guinea and its neighbours of a joint international naval force to patrol the Gulf of Guinea and protect its rich oil resources.
Nigeria’s leader has asked the United States, which has major oil interests in the region, to help with logistics and training for the proposed Gulf of Guinea Guard Force.
U.S. CONCERN
The United States, which has created a new Africa Command (AFRICOM) to increase its security footprint on the world’s poorest continent, already imports more than 15 percent of its oil needs from the Gulf of Guinea and this is expected to increase to more than 25 percent by 2015.
“Piracy and theft are major concerns along the Gulf of Guinea coast — an area that stretches for nearly 2,000 nautical miles,” U.S. AFRICOM Commander William Ward said in testimony to Congress earlier this month.
“Shipping ports, transit areas, harbours, oil production, and transshipment areas are largely unobserved, uncontrolled, and vulnerable to attacks by terrorist groups, criminal gangs, or separatist militias,” he added.
The U.S. Navy and Coastguard has stepped up patrols and visits along Africa’s West Coast to increase maritime safety, bolster cooperation with local navies and offer them training.
The U.S. navy high-speed vessel Swift is due to visit Nigeria’s commercial capital and port of Lagos next week for a joint training exercise with the Nigerian Navy.
Nigeria’s military has struggled to control the activities of militants, pirates and oil smugglers in the swamps and shallow coastal waters of the Niger Delta, where most of the country’s oil is produced.
The Niger Delta militants say they are seeking greater benefits for local communities and political autonomy. Dozens of foreign and Nigerian crew of oil vessels and rigs have been taken hostage by ransom seekers in Nigerian waters in the past two years. Almost all were released unharmed. (For full Reuters Africa coverage and to have your say on the top issues, visit: http://africa.reuters.com/) (Writing by Pascal Fletcher)