ChevronTexaco Inc. (CVX) on Friday said it was unwilling to resume oil production in Nigeria after a series of ethnic clashes forced evacuation earlier this month. Royal Dutch/Shell Group stopped its production in the western Niger Delta last Wednesday, and also has not decided when to return to the region.

Andy Norman, a CVX spokesman, said the company wanted a “number of assurances” that it was safe before any workers returned. “It is down to the government and security forces to provide the assurances we need to return.”

CVX evacuated staff and shut down most of its oil and gas installations in Nigeria last week after fighting between ethnic militants and government forces appeared to be escalating. Nigeria is the fifth-largest petroleum supplier to the United States and likely a major liquefied natural gas supplier in the future. However, the country has been undergoing substantial economic reform under a new civilian administration as it transitions from a military government.

The fighting in Nigeria has already cut multi-national oil exports by an estimated 350,000 bbl/d as of Monday, about one-sixth of Nigeria’s total production of 2 million bbl/d. In Angola, where CVX is the country’s largest oil producer, and in Nigeria, the company’s combined average production exceeds 1.1 million bbl/d. Offshore Nigeria, the company’s Agbami Field was one of the nation’s largest-ever deepwater discoveries in 1999.

In the first quarter 2003 issue of CVX, the company’s global publication, Chevron Nigeria Ltd. said it processed up to 480,000 bbl of oil and natural gas a day at the Escravos terminal in Nigeria. It also employs 2,000 in the country, with 90% of them Nigerian. CVX, considered the country’s largest private investor, started Nigeria’s first major project to gather and process natural gas with its Escravos Gas Project 1 in 1997. It also began front-end engineering on a proposed gas-to-liquids plant in Escravos, which is designed to produce fuel and end flaring of 300 MMcf/d.

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