Environmental experts warn gas flaring by the Nigerian oil industry in the southern Delta region causes acid rain, respiratory infections, skins diseases and land degradation in dozens of local communities, but some environmentalists defend the country’s right to continue flaring.

Reporters Without Borders is saddened and dismayed by the murder of Paul Abayomi Ogundeji, a reporter for the privately-owned daily Thisday and a member of its editorial board. He was gunned down in Lagos on 17 August, less than two years after Godwin Agbroko, the chairman of its editorial board, was killed in similar circumstances.

The Environmental Rights Action/ Friends of the Earth, Nigeria (ERA/FoEN) has condemned Tuesday's arrest and detention of its officers, community elders and some journalists at Iwherekan community, Delta State by soldiers guarding gas flaring sites operated by Shell. The group demands their immediate release and an apology from the military and Shell.

There is no explicit gay scene in Nigeria, but in the Ibiza bar in the capital, Abuja, the action on the packed dance floor seems a little more exclusively guy-on-guy, a little bit raunchier than may be considered "normal".

A militant group in Nigeria's oil-rich Niger Delta region has handed over two German hostages kidnapped last month. The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend) said they rescued the two men from another militant group who had kidnapped them.

On 11 August 2008, Abdulhamid Adiomoh, the Nigerian publisher and editor of "Today", a privately-owned, Banjul-based newspaper, was arrested again and detained overnight at the Serious Crime Unit of the Gambian Police Force in the capital city, Banjul. Adiomoh was arrested previously in July and accused by the police of "publishing with seditious intentions".

Petrol tankers parked nose-to-tail line the five-kilometre stretch of road from the southern Nigerian town of Eleme to its refinery, waiting to fuel up and begin their long journey home. If the trip runs smoothly, a tanker leaving the big cities of the north at dawn should arrive at Eleme, in the troubled oil-rich delta region, by early evening.

Nigeria has handed over the potentially oil-rich Bakassi peninsula to Cameroon, bringing an end to a long-standing dispute over the territory. The handover ceremony was moved from the peninsula's main town to Calabar in Nigeria amid security concerns. Over the past year about 50 people have been killed in clashes. The majority of the local population considers itself Nigerian, but an international court ruled in favour of Cameroon in 2002.

After a long wait, Globacom has announced that its Glo cable will reach Ghana by May 2009 and Nigeria shortly thereafter. It is still not clear when the cable will become operational and although company is talking of 14 West African landing points, it seems unlikely that this will happen.

A Nigerian court has denied bail to the suspected leader of the main militant group in the oil-producing Niger Delta, defence lawyers said on Friday. Henry Okah is believed to be the leader of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), whose campaign of sabotage against Africa's biggest oil industry has cut output by a fifth, helping to push up global energy prices.

Civil society activists in Nigeria are welcoming the World Bank’s acknowledgement of a series of damaging mistakes during the building of the World Bank-financed West African Gas Pipeline (WAGP) running from Nigeria through Benin, Togo, and Ghana. But they also say the report does not go far enough in answering crucial questions.

A ruling by the Abuja Federal High Court has ordered the Nigerian government to halt the transfer of the disputed oil-rich Bakassi peninsula to Cameroon pending the determination of a case against the move. The ruling will strike a blow to an agreement on the transfer of the peninsula to Cameroon on 14 August this year. Until the International Court of Justice ruled in favour of Cameroon, the two sides had had several clashes over the area's ownership.

The Nigerian government ratified CEDAW in 1985 without reservations. Consequently, it is bound to fulfill all obligations stated in article 2 towards the promotion of the principles of CEDAW. The situation of women’s human rights in Nigeria, however, signifies that the Nigerian Government is not carrying out its obligations as CEDAW requires. The sorry state of women’s rights in Nigeria has been attributed to the non-domestication of and non-implementation of CEDAW.

Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua said on Thursday the biggest problem in Africa's most populous nation was poor leadership and rounded on public servants who abused their positions of power to gain personal wealth. Even among follow Africans, Nigeria is seen as the home of the "big man" mentality, where "Ogas" -- bosses in pidgin -- bark commands at all and sundry and travel in convoys with blaring sirens through the chaotic traffic.

Opening new opportunities for women is a key to development, as well to strengthen efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015. In Nigeria, where cultural attitudes and traditional beliefs often circumscribe women’s roles and hinder access to training and education, a women’s project is changing lives.

Curse of the Black Gold: 50 Years of Oil in the Niger Delta takes a graphic look at the profound cost of oil exploitation in West Africa. Featuring images by world-renowned photojournalist Ed Kashi and text by Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka, prominent Nigerian journalists, human rights activists, and University of California at Berkeley professor Michael Watts, this book traces the 50-year history of Nigeria’s oil interests and the resulting environmental degradation and community conflicts that have plagued the region.

The trafficking of girls from villages to cities in Nigeria is increasing and the state is powerless to stop the trade, officials told IRIN. “The business of recruiting teenage girls as domestic help in rich and middle-class homes is booming despite our efforts to put a stop to it”, Bello Ahmed, head of the Kano office of the National Agency for the Prohibition of Traffic in Persons (NAPTIP), told IRIN.

An armed group in Nigeria's delta region said it will resume attacks on oil installations and other facilities after Britain pledged help in tackling unrest in the south. The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend) said on Thursday that the two-week-old ceasefire will end at midnight (23:00 GMT) on Saturday.

Niger Delta Militant group has threatened to end its two weeks cease fire on Saturday midnight in the region following a statement made by the British Prime Minister Gordon Brown at the just concluded G8 summit in Japan that he would end violence in the region.

The Federal Government has announced the suspension of the Policy Support Instrument (PSI) designed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), for the government of former President Olusegun Obasanjo for poverty reduction.