Militants in Nigeria are planning a major new wave of attacks and kidnappings in the next few days that could include up to 20 simultaneous bombings across the country’s oil-rich delta region, US diplomats warned today.

Two kidnapped British oil workers have been released in Nigeria and six more hostages who are still being held are expected to be set free later today.

NIGERIAN kidnappers have said their American hostage is gravely ill and threatened to kill three other foreign oil workers held captive if he died.

President Olusegun Obasanjo’s ruling party has expelled the Nigeria governor charged in Britain with money laundering.

DOZENS of villagers have been killed, many hacked to death, in three days of clashes between rival political factions battling for influence in an oil-rich area of the Niger Delta, activists and witnesses said on Tuesday.