(Reuters) – Nigerian gunmen have freed four foreign oil workers kidnapped in two separate incidents in the Niger Delta last month, a military spokesman said on Thursday.
Sagir Musa, spokesman for the military task force (JTF) in Rivers state, said one Portuguese and one Ukrainian national taken on May 13 from an oil supply vessel contracted to U.S. oil firm Chevron, were released early on Wednesday.
The fate of the other nine Nigerian crew members taken from the ship, the MV Lourdes Tide, was not immediately clear.
“In line with the JTF disposition no ransom was paid despite persistent requests from the abductors,” Musa said.
He said a Pakistani and a Maltese working for oil services company Lonestar, who were kidnapped in the Niger Delta in a separate incident on May 23, had also been released.
Militants pushing for greater local control over oil revenues and development have bombed oil pipelines in the Niger Delta in recent years but criminal gangs are also making big profits from stealing crude and kidnapping for ransom.
The main militant group in the region — the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) — said at the time that it was not behind the hijack of the MV Lourdes Tide, operated by oil services firm Tidewater Nigeria Ltd.
The unidentified kidnappers initially wanted 30 million naira ($226,000) to release the crew but slashed their demand to 5 million naira a few days later.