LAGOS (Nigeria) - NIGERIAN armed group MEND threatened Saturday to thwart a US$10 billion (S$14.6 billion) trans-Saharan gas pipeline project linking vast reserves in Nigeria to Europe.
'Any money put into the project will go down the drain as we will ensure that it faces the same fate other pipelines are facing today,' the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta said in an email statement.
On Friday, three African countries - Algeria, Niger and Nigeria - signed a deal in Abuja to build the more than 4,000-kilometre pipeline conveying gas destined for the European market from the Niger Delta in Nigeria, via Niger and Algeria.
No date was announced for the start of construction, but the first delivery of gas is scheduled in 2015.
Mend urged oil firms still operating in the restive Niger Delta to leave immediately, threatening - in coded language - to carry out new attacks within the next three days.
'Within the next 72 hours Hurricane Piper Alpha will be upgraded to Hurricane Moses,' it warned.
The group also accused Nigeria's military Joint Task Force (JTF) - tasked with protecting oil installations and personnel in the region - of abducting a traditional ruler of the area.
It said Isaac Thikan, the Agadagba of Egbema and a staunch critic of the military, was abducted on June 24 and taken to JTF headquarters in Effurun, Warri.
Mend, which came to prominence in December 2005, has claimed responsibility for many violent attacks on oil firms and interests in the past few months.
The unrest in the Niger Delta has reduced Nigeria's oil exports to 1.8 million barrels per day, from 2.6 million in 2006. -- AFP
