Tue May 26, 2009 3:25pm EDT
(Adds start of trial delayed until next week)
NEW YORK, May 26 (Reuters) – A civil trial over the alleged involvement of giant oil producer Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSa.L) in the executions of protesters in Nigeria in the 1990s has been delayed until next week, a court clerk said on Tuesday.
Jury selection in the case had been scheduled to begin on Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, but a clerk in the chambers of presiding Judge Kimba Wood said there would be a conference in the case on Monday. Jury selection would begin on Tuesday at the earliest, the clerk said.
A spokesman for the Center for Constitutional Rights, representing relatives of protesters, said in a statement that the trial had been delayed.
Shell is accused of human rights abuses, including violations connected with the 1995 hangings of prominent activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight other protesters by Nigeria’s then-military government.
Shell has denied allegations of involvement.
The case was brought by relatives of Saro-Wiwa and others under a 1789 U.S. statute, the Alien Tort Claims Act, allowing noncitizens to file cases in U.S. courts for human rights abuses occurring overseas.
The case is Wiwa, et al v Anderson, et al 01-01909 in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York (Manhattan) (Reporting by Edith Honan; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Gerald E. McCormick)
© Thomson Reuters 2009 All rights reserved
This website and sisters royaldutchshellplc.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.
Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
MORE DETAILS:
A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
