Nigerian Oil Field Shut Down After Attack

Militants in speedboats raided an oil installation off Nigeria's southern coastline on Thursday. This forced Royal Dutch Shell to slash production and exposed Africa's biggest oil industry as vulnerable even on the high seas. This was the farthest ever attack in the open ocean of the fighters of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta which is about 85 miles into the oil rich Gulf of Guinea. This group is Nigeria's most effective militant gang. Launched in 2006, its campaign of bombing pipelines and attacks on export facilities had already slashed Nigeria's daily oil output by about 20 percent. This helped send global oil prices to all time highs.