[1][2] MEND's actions – including sabotage, theft, property destruction, guerrilla warfare, and kidnapping – are part of the broader conflict in the Niger Delta and reduced Nigeria's oil production by 33% between 2006-07.

[2] The then President Umaru Musa Yaradua administration created an amnesty program to liaise with the group to drop their alms and ammunition in 2009 and embrace government intervention in the Nigeri Delta region.

[3][4] This amnesty was welcomed by the group as some of its top leaders, including Henry Okah and Ebikabowei Victor-Ben accepted the government's offer.

Its composition includes members of the Ijaw who accuse the government and overseas oil firms with promoting massive economic inequalities, fraud, and environmental degradation.

In an interview with one of the group's leaders, who used the alias Major-General Godswill Tamuno, the BBC reported that MEND was fighting for "total control" of the Niger Delta's oil wealth, saying local people had not gained from the riches under the ground and the region's creeks and swamps.

The people of the Niger Delta have suffered catastrophic degradation of their environment due to unchecked pollution produced by the oil industry.

As a result of this policy of dispossessing people from their lands in favor of foreign oil interests, within a single generation, many now have no ability to fish or farm.

"[12] Beginning in the 1980s, several political movements emerged to oppose the environmental injustices perpetrated upon the people of the Niger Delta by the government and the oil companies.

Saro-Wiwa was an Ogoni poet-turned-activist who was executed by the Nigerian government in 1995 on what many believe to be deliberately false charges with the aim of silencing his vocal opposition to the oil interests in Nigeria.

[22] Former United States Air Force "counter-terrorism" officer, technology analyst, and software entrepreneur, John Robb, in a Wired Magazine interview about the emergence of "open source guerrillas", alleged that MEND "doesn’t even field its own guerillas.

A company official stated, "Eni has temporarily evacuated staff and contractors from the area of the base affected by the incident and the situation is currently under control.

On May 10, 2006, an executive with the United States-based oil company Baker Hughes was shot and killed in the south-eastern city of Port Harcourt.

On May 1, 2007, at 4:15 a.m., MEND attacked Chevron's Oloibiri floating production, storage, and offloading vessel off the coast of the southern Bayelsa state.

After one hour of fighting with security boats, resulting in the death of 10 people, MEND seized six expatriate workers, consisting of four Italians (Mario Celentano, Raffaele Pasceriello, Ignazio Gugliotta, Alfonso Franza), an American (John Stapelton), and a Croat (Jurica Ruic).

On the same day, MEND published photos of the captives seated on white plastic chairs in a wooden shelter around the remains of a campfire.

[27] On May 3, 2008, MEND militants attacked Shell-operated pipelines in Nigeria, forcing the company to halt 170,000 barrels per day (27,000 m3/d) of exports of Bonny Light crude.

[29] On September 14, 2008, MEND inaugurated the Operation Hurricane Barbarossa with an ongoing string of militant attacks to bring down the oil industry in Rivers State.

The Nigerian government confirmed that their troops were attacked in numerous locations, but said that all assaults were repelled with the infliction of heavy casualties on the militants.

[38] MEND has claimed responsibility for pipeline attacks on June 18–21 on three oil installations belonging to Royal Dutch Shell in the Niger Delta.

In a campaign labeled by the group as "Hurricane Piper Alpha", Chevron was also warned that it would "pay a price" for allowing the Nigerian military use of an oil company airstrip.

[39] On June 18, MEND claimed they had blown up a Shell pipeline, as a warning to Russian president Dmitry Medvedev who was arriving to Nigeria the next day and to any potential foreign investors [40] On June 26, MEND attacked the Shell Billie/Krakama pipeline as a warning to foreign investors timed with the visit to Nigeria of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

The militants claim that the manifold carried some 80 percent of Chevron Nigeria Limited's off-shore crude oil to a loading platform.

In a separate action on the same day, the group said that three Russians, two Filipinos and an Indian were seized Sunday from the Siehem Peace oil tanker about 30 kilometres (20 mi) from the southern port city of Escravos.

Rebels attacked and set on fire the Atlas Cove Jetty on Tarkwa Bay, which is a major oil hub for Nigeria.

February 13: MEND gunmen shot dead the captain and chief engineer of a cargo ship 180 km (110 mi) off the coast of Nigeria.

July 27: MEND gunmen attacked an oil carrier operated by Agip off the coast of Bayelsa State leaving 1 sailor dead.

September 5: MEND gunmen hijacked the oil tanker Abu Dhabi Star 23 km (14 mi) off the coast of Nigeria.

March 26: MEND leader Henry Okah is sentenced to 24 years in prison by a South African court for the October 2010 Abuja attacks.

April 16: MEND spokesman Jomo Gbomo sent an e-mail to Bloomberg News threatening to "bomb mosques, hajj camps, and other Islamic institutions."

June 19: 2 Indian and 2 Polish sailors were kidnapped by pirates affiliated to MEND after the oil vessel MDPL Continental One was attacked 48 km (30 mi) off the Nigerian coast.