Mobil says sorry for Nigerian oil spill

The Mobil oil company has apologised for Nigeria's biggest oil spill, and has promised to compensate those who clearly suffered as a result.

In a statement published in the Nigerian press, Mobil said it did not yet know why more than one-million gallons of crude oil leaked from a pipeline last week, at the mouth of the Pennington river in the south-east of the country.

The leak caused an oil slick which polluted beaches and fishing waters.

The apology comes after street protests by fishermen, and allegations that foreign oil companies pay less attention to standards in Nigeria than they might in the West.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service