Rights Group Amnesty International has stated that oil company Shell still bears responsibility for cleaning up and remedying historic oil pollution in Nigeria’s Niger Delta, despite the company’s divestment of its Nigerian subsidiary https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2025/09/nigeria-shell-remains-responsible-for-cleaning-up-and-remediating-historic-oil-pollution-despite-divestment/
The organization’s statement follows a letter recently sent by UN Rapporteurs on Human Rights to oil companies, as well as to the governments of the companies’ home countries, regarding the businesses’ human rights obligations towards populations suffering from pollution caused by their activities in their homelands.
The 2025 UN Special Rapporteur report, A/HRC/59/42, outlines States’ obligations and businesses’ responsibilities to phase out fossil fuels and related subsidies, emphasizing a just, human rights-based transition to a healthy environment. The term “Special Rapporteur’s report on access to justice for hazardous substances” is a reference to the work of the former Special Rapporteur on the Implications for Human Rights of the Environmentally Sound Management and Disposal of Hazardous Substances and Wastes, whose reports discuss how exposure to toxic chemicals can deny people access to justice for health and environmental harm.
Shell’s Position is that large-scale oil theft is the primary cause of pollution in the Niger Delta, not its own operations; it denies wrongdoing and intends to defend itself against the claims for pollution affecting communities in Ogale and Bille. It does however acknowledge that operational spills do occur, and states that they clean up and remediate such spills, and compensate communities when the spills are operational.
In the meanwhile, the legal process rumbles on; a court of appeal ruling in October 2024 allowed the communities’ claims to proceed to a full trial, overturning a previous ruling that would have restricted their ability to seek justice, and in June 2025, the High Court ruled that Shell and its former Nigerian subsidiary could be held legally responsible for the historic oil pollution impacting communities in Ogale and Bille. A preliminary issues trial took place in February-March 2025, and the full trial is set to occur in March 2027.
