Nigeria Military Repel Attack On ExxonMobil

`The shooting lasted about 30 minutes ... All residents have been accounted for,` one of the sources said.

Nigerian security forces repelled an attack by gunmen on an Exxon Mobil housing compound in the Niger Delta state of Akwa Ibom, the local unit of the U.S. energy giant said on Wednesday.

The attack on the Mobil Producing Nigeria (MPN) compound in Eket, where security measures were reinforced in December following a rise in violence in Akwa Ibom, took place at around 2200 GMT on Tuesday, security sources said.

"Government security forces successfully repelled unidentified armed men in the vicinity of (MPN's) Eket compound in Akwa Ibom state. During the incident, shots were fired," MPN said in a statement.

"No casualties have been reported."

The security sources said the shooting had lasted around 30 minutes but that the attackers had been repelled on the waterways around the compound and had not got inside the site.

Insecurity in the Niger Delta has largely focused on the three main oil-producing states of Rivers, Delta and Bayelsa but there have been a growing number of attacks in Akwa Ibom, further east towards Cameroon.

Armed men attacked an Exxon oil platform off Akwa Ibom last month, while in December gunmen attacked a convoy belonging to Exxon's local unit MPN as it travelled towards the nearby Qua Iboe oil terminal in an apparent failed kidnap attempt.

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), the region's main militant group, called off a 5-month-old ceasefire at the end of January, warning of a "sweeping assault" on Nigeria's oil and gas industry.

The group has not carried out any major strikes which have had an impact on production since the end of the ceasefire, but it has warned that kidnapping "high-value" U.S. and European oil workers remains part of its strategy.