LAGOS: Gunmen in Nigeria's restive southern delta kidnapped the principal of a school sponsored by Exxon Mobil Corp., killing two police officers in a firefight marking the latest abduction in the region, officials said Thursday. Akwa Ibom state police commissioner Walter Rugbere told The Associated Press that gunmen attacked a car carrying Lakshmi Tombush, an Indian national, early Wednesday morning outside of Eket. A police officer guarding Tombush, as well as an officer driving the car, died in the ambush, Rugbere said. The commissioner said police continued to investigate the attack. "The police would not discuss ransom, they would just look for a way to rescue her," Rugbere said. "That's what they're doing." Tombush serves as the head of the Pegasus Schools in Eket, the headquarters of Exxon Mobil's Nigerian subsidiary in the country. A statement issued by the subsidiary Thursday morning confirmed Tombush had been abducted, but did not offer any other details. Exxon Mobil is the dominant industrial force in Akwa Ibom. Exxon Mobil's large oil tanks, graced with a Pegasus logo, run along the Akwa Ibom state's beaches and the company even runs its own airfield. The gas-flared flames of its offshore oil platforms can be see across the horizon. By focusing on offshore exploration, Exxon Mobil has avoided much of the troubles facing foreign oil firms operating in the Niger Delta, a region of swamps and snaking creeks rutted with mangrove trees about the size of South Carolina. Militants in the region began a campaign of kidnapping and pipeline bombings in 2006, upset over pollution and the region's endemic poverty despite 50 years of oil production. The number of attack has dwindled in recent months since a government-sponsored amnesty program offered militants cash payouts and the promise of job training. However, the number of violent kidnappings targeting middle-class Nigerians has skyrocketed this year. The expatriate workers criminals and militants once targeted now live in fortified compounds and paramilitary police escort them through crowded streets.
