AFP
NEW YORK (AFP) A pre-trial conference scheduled in the potentially landmark lawsuit brought by Nigerian plaintiffs against oil giant Royal Dutch Shell has been delayed until Wednesday, court papers show.
The conference was announced last week following the decision by the presiding judge in the US Southern District Court in New York to delay indefinitely the actual trial. It had been planned for Monday, but now has been pushed back two days.
“The court hereby postpones the conference scheduled … until Wednesday,” Judge Kimba Wood said in an order dated Friday. She gave no explanation.
Jury selection in the trial itself had been meant to start April 27, but was put off the day before. No new date was set.
The judge then scheduled the pre-trial conference, which has now also been delayed.
A spokesman for the Center for Constitutional Rights, which represents the Nigerian plaintiffs, told AFP there was no further indication about the future of the trial. The spokesman would not comment on the reasons for the delay.
Shell is accused of complicity in the 1995 hanging of Saro-Wiwa, a renowned writer and activist, and other leaders of a movement protesting alleged environmental destruction and other abuses by Shell against the Ogoni people in the Niger Delta.
The corporation, which has a powerful presence in Nigeria, is also accused of complicity in the torture, detention and exile of Saro-Wiwa’s brother, Owens Wiwa, and other violent attacks on dissidents in the country.
Shell denies all the charges.
The civil suit was brought by victims of Nigeria’s former military government, including Saro-Wiwa’s son.
They sued under the Alien Tort Claims Act, a little-used US law that dates to 1789 and which is being increasingly dusted off as a way to target human rights violations in foreign countries.
The act requires companies with a substantial presence in the United States to obey US law everywhere in the world.
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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: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
