Tue Nov 30, 2010 7:33am EST
* Shell invite relates to $240 million case settled in U.S.
* Halliburton staff, MD called in after arrests last week
ABUJA, Nov 30 (Reuters) – Nigeria’s anti-corruption police said on Tuesday they wanted to interview the country heads of Shell (RDSa.L) and U.S. oil services firm Halliburton (HAL.N) as part of investigations into two separate bribery cases.
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) briefly detained 10 Halliburton staff for questioning last week in relation to a $180 million bribery case involving the U.S. firm’s former unit KBR (KBR.N). [ID:nLDE6AQ0BH]
The companies split in 2007 and Halliburton has said it is not connected with the case. The Shell executive had been invited for questioning in relation to a separate $240 million case settled by the oil major and the Swiss logistics firm Panalpina (PWTN.S) in the United States earlier this month, officials said. [ID:nN0494954]
“We have invited the MDs (managing directors) of Shell and Halliburton as part of investigations in two separate bribery cases,” EFCC spokesman Femi Babafemi said.
“The $240 million Shell bribery issue has been dealt with in the U.S. and we are looking at the Nigeria end of things.”
Last month, the U.S. government said a Panalpina unit agreed to plead guilty in its case, admitting to paying at least $27 million in bribes to officials in at least seven countries including Nigeria, Brazil and Russia between 2002 and 2007 on behalf of its oil and gas industry clients.
Shell’s Nigerian unit agreed to settle charges and pay $30 million in criminal penalties, the Justice Department said.
“We will cooperate fully with the (Nigerian) authorities in any investigation that they may undertake but we will not comment on specifics,” a Shell spokesman in Nigeria said.
The EFCC detained 10 Nigerian and expatriate Halliburton staff for questioning last week as well as one senior employee each from oil firms Saipem Contracting Nigeria Ltd (SPMI.MI) and Technip Offshore Nigeria Ltd (TECF.PA).
Houston-based engineering firm KBR pleaded guilty last year to U.S. charges that it paid $180 million in bribes between 1994 and 2004 to Nigerian officials to secure $6 billion in contracts for the Bonny Island liquefied natural gas (LNG) project.
KBR and Halliburton reached a $579 million settlement in the United States but Nigeria, France and Switzerland have conducted their own investigations into the case.
Halliburton said it was not involved in the LNG development, its employees have never participated in any work on the project and the EFCC raid last week had no legal basis.
It said its offices were ransacked and personnel assaulted in the raid in what it said was “an affront against justice”.
(Reporting by Joe Brock; Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)
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.
