The campaign using the strategy of deleting the ‘S’ from the Shell logo to underscore the evils that the energy provider has done through the decades is not new. It was also done back in the last days of Apartheid in South Africa when ‘Shell was banned in Europe by a lot of people because of the wrong choices they made.’

Now, Amnesty International takes it into the latest and high-tech realm with the use of Google Maps. The Shell-as-hell campaign visually shows where on the Google map of the Niger Delta has Shell done considerable damage. Details of these human rights violations and environmental damage are comprehensively documented via the Amnesty International report entitled ‘Petroleum, Pollution and Poverty in the Niger Delta.’

The Niger Delta is ‘one of the 10 most important wetland and coastal marine ecosystems in the world and is home to some 31 million people. The Niger Delta is also the location of massive oil deposits, which have been extracted for decades by the government of Nigeria and by multinational oil companies. Oil has generated an estimated $600 billion since the 1960s.’ Nigeria owns roughly 36.2 billion barrels of oil reserves, with most of that centered in the Niger Delta region.

According to Amnesty International, ‘More than 9 million barrels of oil have spilled into the Niger Delta region, posing grave humanitarian and environmental concerns. Activity by the oil industry in the Niger Delta over the past 50 years has created dire conditions for the civilian population.’

The group reports, “Decades of pollution and environmental damage, caused by the oil industry, have resulted in violations of the right to an adequate standard of living, including food and water, violations of the right to gain a living through work and violations of the right to health.”

The report also accuses oil companies of ‘under-reporting of oil spills, the flaring of gas near villages and the disposal of waste near wetlands, agricultural and fishing areas.’ Most importantly, Amnesty’s report ‘focuses largely on the activity of Royal Dutch Shell in the Niger Delta as the source of most of the problems cited.’

Via osocio