Shell Settles Nigerian Human Rights Case for $15.5 Million

Article on cnnmoney.com -- Shell pays $15.5M in Nigeria suit: Oil company settles a claim that it violated human rights leading to the killings of a famous writer and other activists in 1995.  Here's an excerpt:

Shell has agreed to a $15.5 million settlement in a lawsuit that claimed the oil company supported civil rights abuses in Nigeria that led to the killings of a famous writer and other activists in 1995.

The family of writer Ken Saro-Wiwa and nine other people filed the suit in New York, alleging that Shell was partially responsible for the then-military regime's oppression of the Ogoni people in the Niger Delta. Saro-Wiwa and other activists were protesting what they saw as environmental abuses by Shell.

Shell, which said it "had no part in the violence that took place," called the settlement "a humanitarian gesture to set up a trust fund to benefit the Ogoni people."

BGS