Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo on Thursday ordered that all defense and security personnel in the southern oil-rich Niger Delta be placed in a state of "high alert" after two pipeline explosions that reportedly left 16 people killed.

"The president gave the order at a meeting with senior members of the nation's security and intelligence communities," a presidential statement said. "The meeting was called to review the security situation in the Niger Delta following two pipelines explosions in the region in the past few days."

The statement said Obasanjo had reaffirmed the determination of the Nigerian government to provide adequate protection for persons and oil installations in the Niger Delta, where the majority of the world's eighth largest crude exporter's oil is produced.

"We will not abandon this country to brigands. Criminals must be chased, caught and punished," Obasanjo was quoted as telling the defense and security chiefs.

One of the two pipelines attacked by unidentified gunmen belonged to the biggest player in Nigeria's oil field, Royal Dutch Shell, which had been forced to declare a "force majeure" and then halt oil supplies from the west African country.

Shell had closed two oilfields and a flow station producing about 180,000 barrels per day (bpd) in all, or seven percent of the country's oil output, as part of efforts to extinguish the fire caused by Tuesday's pipeline explosion, 50 km southwest of the oil city of Port Harcourt.

The fire had killed at least 11 people so far, Nigerian newspapers reported. Shell said the explosion may have been caused by a dynamite attack carried out by unidentified persons, whose motives are yet to be identified.

But Nigerian Minister of State for Petroleum Edmund Daukoru said that the move of Shell would not affect the country's crude export.

"The incident will not hamper our production because we are even producing above our quota since we are also producing from our condensate," Daukoru told the official News Agency of Nigeria.

A fresh pipeline explosion claimed five lives in Edo, one of the oil-producing states in the Niger Delta, barely 24 hours after the Shell fire, Nigeria's Vanguard newspaper reported.

Oil thieves cut through the pipeline operated by state-run Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. at Ehor in the Uhunmwode local government but a spark ignited a fire that caused the explosion, it said.

Hundreds of people died yearly while collecting fuel in this way in the Niger Delta, which remains one of the country's poorest regions and has in the past decade been racked by instability and violence.

Source: Xinhua