The resultant destruction of land and contamination of rivers has made it impossible for Niger Delta citizens to continue to fish and farm. Meanwhile, Nigeria’s leaders have grown rich from corporate oil, and gladly assign security forces to counter, and sometimes silence, citizen protests. In 1995 the military dictatorship of General Sani Abacha deemed hanging to be the necessary means to quell the articulate voice of poet Ken Saro-Wiwa and his eight fellow Ogoni activists.

These nine Ogoni environmentalists were hanged in Nigeria following a sham trial that attempted to end protests against the government and Shell. Saro-Wiwa, who founded the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People, had led these peaceful protests for almost two decades. One would have hoped that these activists' sacrifice, and the accompanying international outrage, would have led to an era of corporate responsibility and respect for human rights. Instead, a decade later, Niger Delta communities still struggle to survive as oil companies protect their own single-minded interests.

Case in point: According to a recent Amnesty International report, Chevron has failed to pursue an independent inquiry into Nigerian soldiers' use of force against more than 200 protesters at its Escravos oil terminal in Ugborodo, which resulted in 30 serious injuries and one death earlier this year. Similarly, an alleged security arrangement between a Shell Nigeria subcontractor and a criminal group in Odioma led to the murders of 17 people, the rape of two women, and the razing of 80 percent of the homes in the area. Neither the company nor the Nigerian government has investigated the incident.

The international outrage following the 1995 executions led the extractive and energy industry, in partnership with the U.S. and U.K. governments and international non-governmental organizations, to develop Voluntary Principles for Security and Human Rights. Though Shell and Chevron both claim to support the principles, there is little evidence of their compliance with them in Nigeria. Of greater significance, the U.S. Department of State has failed to monitor such compliance.

Nigeria is the largest African producer of oil and the United States is the largest purchaser of Nigerian oil. At the same time that polluted water and soil make a sustainable life of fishing or farming increasingly rare in the Niger Delta, many indigenous oil workers see no oil revenues. And men and women continue to die from violent exchanges at oil sites, while all incidents go uninvestigated by the oil companies and both the Nigerian and United States governments. Unless there is an end to the ecological assault upon the Niger Delta and the inequitable distribution of oil revenues, violence is bound to continue and escalate.

The Voluntary Principles for Security and Human Rights specify that companies should make public their policies regarding human rights conduct to security providers, and work to see that security is provided in a manner consistent with those policies. Shell and Chevron must immediately investigate and report on the incidents this year in Odioma and Ugborodo. In addition, the United States needs to guarantee that our oil companies in the Delta comply with the Voluntary Principles.

In the final words of Ken Saro-Wiwa: "Whether the peaceful ways I have favored will prevail depends on what the oppressor decides, what signals it sends out to the waiting public. Come the day."

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Dee Burton is Nigeria country specialist for Amnesty International USA and adjunct associate professor of urban public health at Hunter College, City University of New York. Founded in 1961, Amnesty International is a Nobel Prize winning grassroots activist organization with over 1 million members worldwide. Amnesty International USA (AIUSA) is the U.S. Section of this international human rights movement. www.amnesty-usa.org – A photo of Dee Burton is available CLICK HERE