Royal Dutch Shell will be questioned by politicians over its operations in Nigeria two months after tensions over oil exploration in the region flared up again.
Dutch lawmakers have arranged a hearing, described as a “fact-finding session”, after several MPs travelled to the troubled Niger Delta region.
A ceasefire between militants opposed to foreign oil exploration and the government broke down in November.
Pipeline bombings caused output to fall 40pc in Africa’s top oil producer until a ceasefire in July 2009. However, this collapsed when 13 hostages were taken from Afren and ExxonMobil’s oil installations this autumn.
Nigeria’s army, navy and air force launched a large offensive six weeks ago, storming rebel camps and jailing insurgents.
Shell has been criticised by environmental groups for the high level of oil spills in Nigeria, which could be as much as 9m barrels since oil exploration began in the 1950s.
The company claims that these are mostly the result of sabotage by militants, but Amnesty International has claimed that 2,000 sites have still not been cleaned up.
It also emerged in US diplomatic cables released on the Wikileaks website that Shell’s Nigeria head Ann Pickard claimed to have infiltrated the country’s government.
She was quoted as saying in the leaked documents that “the GON [government of Nigeria] had forgotten that Shell had seconded people to all the relevant ministries and that Shell consequently had access to everything that was being done in those ministries.” Shell said this statement was “absolutely untrue, false and misleading.”
Shell has been trying to sell up to $4bn (£2.6bn) of onshore oil assets in the African country for more than a year.
Yesterday, the company declined to comment on the political hearings about its activities in Nigeria.
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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.
