Six kidnapped oil workers escape

Six hostages have escaped from an oil facility in Nigeria where they had been held since armed men raided it earlier this week.

Forty-eight Nigerian employees of Agip, a subsidiary of Italian oil giant Eni SpA, were seized on Monday when armed protesters overran and shut down the company’s Tebidaba oil pumping station.

The action shut off around 50,000 barrels of crude production per day.

A Rome-based spokesman for the company said six of the hostages escaped yesterday and made their way to a neighbouring state, where they were treated by Agip staff for minor injuries from running through the swamps.

Meanwhile, Hafiz Ringim, the police commissioner for Bayelsa State, where the pumping station is located, said earlier that kidnappers were demanding a ransom of $75,000 dollars (€58,000) to free the hostages.

“Negotiations are still going on. But these people are always asking for money,” Ringim said. “Most of these hostage-takings are just about money.”