Britains High Court began hearing lawsuits on Tuesday filed by the Ogale and Bille people alleging that decades of oil spills have fouled the water and destroyed the lives of thousands of fishers and farmers in the Niger River Delta, where a Shell subsidiary has operated since the 1950s. While Shell would argue that its settlement with the Bodo community shows its willingness to provide compensation for problems it caused, the new cases involve damage arising from what Shell says is sabotage and theft, Elmes said.

Shell sued in UK for ‘decades of oil spills’ in Nigeria – Aljazeera.com