Nigeria fined Anglo-Dutch petroleum giant Shell one million naira (€5,100) for failing to clean up an oil spill within reasonable time, a company official said last Wednesday.

Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria (SPDC) had been fined over the September 2008 spill in the southern state of Bayelsa which resulted in a fire in adjoining farmland, said the official, who asked not to be identified.

Nigeria's spill detection agency also ordered SPDC, a Shell subsidiary, to pay compensation to victims from the local Peremabiri community once a detailed assessment had been carried out, media reports said.

Oil companies in Nigeria often attribute such incidents to vandalism by armed groups and local residents, although the company official who spoke to AFP last Wednesday did not say whether this 2008 spillage was caused by sabotage.

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