Shell broke the
law by not repairing leaks that destroyed the lands of Niger Delta farmers, a
Dutch court heard in a case that could set a precedent for global environmental
responsibility.
The four Nigerian
farmers, backed by lobby group Friends of the Earth, have brought the
Anglo-Dutch oil giant into court thousands of miles away from their homes with
a civil suit that could open the door for hundreds of similar cases.
"Shell knew
for a long time that the pipeline was damaged but didn't do anything: they
could have stopped the leaks," lawyer Channa Samkalden told the court on
Thursday, accusing Shell of having "violated its legal obligations".
The case relates
to damage caused in 2005 and was initially filed in 2008, demanding that Royal
Dutch Shell clean up the mess, repair and maintain defective pipelines to
prevent further damage and pay out compensation.
In a landmark
ruling, the Dutch judiciary in 2009 declared itself competent to try the case
despite protests from Shell that its Nigerian subsidiary was solely legally
responsible for any damage.
"I'm here
because of the oil leakage that happened in my community in the Shell
facilities and destroyed my 47 fish ponds"," Friday Alfred Akpan,
from the village of Ikot Ada Udo, told us before heading into court.
"The
destruction of the fish ponds caused serious damage to me in person and my family
because I make use of that fish to take care of myself and my children."
Oil pollution has
ravaged swathes of the Niger Delta in the world's eighth largest oil producer,
which exports more than two million barrels a day.
Shell is the
biggest producer in the west African country, where it has been drilling for
over 50 years.
"We believe
that the claims are unsubstantiated," Allard Castelein, Shell's Vice
President Environment, said at the court.
"The spills
that happened in the years between 2004 and 2007 all happened as the
consequence of illegal theft and sabotage."
"We say there
was a spill, it wasn't our fault, we cleaned up nevertheless and that's what
happened," Castelein said.
'Double standards'
Environmental
groups accuse Shell of double standards and treating spills in Nigeria
differently from pollution in Europe or North America.
But Castelein
fended off the accusations, saying: "We do have the same standards in
Europe and Nigeria."
He added: "I
am not afraid of (the court's) judgment as it will just confirm the way we
operate."
Shell's lawyer Jan
de Bie Leuveling Tjeenk said: "Friends of the Earth believe that this
trial will provide a solution to this problem but this is not the case."
Friends of the
Earth however said the scale of Nigeria's oil pollution was twice that of the
five million barrels dumped in the Gulf of Mexico after the explosion on BP's
Deepwater Horizon rig in 2010, in the biggest ever marine spill. Shell however
disputes the Nigerian figure and puts it much lower.
The UN's
environmental agency last year released a landmark report, saying decades of
oil pollution in the Niger Delta's Ogoniland region may require the world's
biggest ever clean-up and could take up to 30 years.
Jonathan
Verschuuren, an environmental law expert at the Netherlands' Tilburg
University, said that a win for the farmers would set a precedent.
"If they win
the case then it will be an important step that multinationals can more easily
be made answerable for the damage they do in developing countries,"
Verschuuren said.
"Until now
it's been very tricky because it's difficult to bring cases against these
companies in developing countries themselves, because the legislation is often
not advanced or properly applied," he said.
Environmentalists
want the Netherlands, and other Western nations, to pass laws forcing companies
to enforce the same environmental responsibility standards abroad as at home.
Judges are
expected to hand down a ruling within the next six weeks to three months.
Shell operates in
over 90 countries, according to its website.
Endemic corruption
Yvonne Ndege,
reporting from Abuja, said the court proceedings were taking place in the Hague
because the plaintiffs have "failed to get their case heard within the
Nigerian judicial system".
Co-plaintiff,
Friends of the Earth, blames endemic corruption for the lack of legal action in
Nigeria itself.
Our correspodent
said the Nigerian legal system is full of "hundreds, if not
thousands" of similar cases that have never been heard, leaving the
plaintiffs with no possibility for compensation.
Ndege said if the
court rules in favour of the plaintiffs it would be a historic step that
"basically means the parent companies, often based in the West, in Europe
or the United States, will be held responsible for any oil damage and pollution
caused by their subsidiaries, wherever they may be".
With around 31
million inhabitants, the Niger Delta, which includes the Ogoniland region, is
one of the top 10 wetland and coastal marine ecosystems in the world and is a
main source of food for the poor, rural population.
It is not only
environmental groups who have been critical of Shell's Nigerian operations.
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