Back in the mid-90's, as I was getting into professional environmental policy and activism work, I learned about Shell oil and Ken Saro-Wiwa. Ken was member of the Ogoni tribe in Nigeria, and led protests of Shell's activities in his village, and he was later executed by the government of Nigeria.

At the time there was a lot of thought, speculation, and more than a little evidence, that Shell had asked the rather brutal government at the time to help with these pesky protesters. And so Ken and a number of his colleagues were sentenced to death on trumped up murder charges.

When I say trumped up, I mean trumped. He was accused of murdering four Ogoni chiefs, despite not having been allowed access to to Ogoniland on the day of the murders.

For a few years, activists worldwide led boycotts against Shell, while their parent company Royal Dutch Shell pled ignorance and innocence.

Meanwhile, human rights groups kept up lawsuits on the issue, and last week it was announced Shell would pay $15.5M. But here's the thing - they said it was a humanitarian gesture, and intended to help with reconciliation, and they were still innocent.

Thankfully, The Independent in the UK has a great article detailing some internal documents from around that time that have a very chilling affect - documents that would've surfaced at a trial starting the day after they made their 'humanitarian settlement' - a trial which will no longer be held.

Read this - from the article - and then see if you ever want to buy Shell oil again:

Days later, Shell met the director general of the state security services to "reiterate our request for support from the army and police". In a confidential note Shell suggested: "We will have to encourage follow-through into real action preferably on an industry rather than just Shell basis". The Nigerian regime responded by sending in the Internal Security Task Force, a military unit led by Colonel Paul Okuntimo, a brutal soldier, widely condemned by human rights groups, whose men allegedly raped pregnant women and girls and who tortured at will. Okuntimo boasted of knowing more than 200 ways to kill a person.

In October 1993, Okuntimo was sent into Ogoni with Shell personnel to inspect equipment. The stand-off that followed left at least one Ogoni protester dead. A hand-written Shell note talked of "entertaining 26 armed forces personnel for lunch" and preparing "normal special duty allowances" for the soldiers. Shell is also accused of involvement with the MPF, which worked with Okuntimo. One witness, Eebu Jackson Nwiyon, claimed they were paid and fed by Shell. Nwiyon also recalls being told by Okuntimo to "leave nobody untouched". When asked what was meant by this, Nwiyon replied: "He meant shoot, kill."