The price of crude oil began soaring again today after two weeks of decline in the wake of claims by a rebel group in Nigeria that its fighters had sabotaged two Shell Oil pipelines in the country's oil-producing areas.

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, or MEND, claimed today "heavily armed" fighters had attacked the pipelines in the southern Rivers state. The attack was the latest in a series of attacks against Shell, a major oil operator in Nigeria.

Shell confirmed one of its pipelines had been attacked and was attempting to assess damage on the other with flights over the area.

But even before confirmation of the facts, oil prices rose on the news, with Brent North Sea crude for September delivery climbing $1.58 to $126.10 a barrel, while New York's main contract, light sweet crude for September, rose by $1.50 to $124.76 dollars a barrel.

A report from MEND said the following: "In keeping with our pledge to resume pipeline attacks within the next 30 days, detonation engineers backed by heavily armed fighters from MEND today ... sabotaged two major pipelines in Rivers state of Nigeria. The first pipeline is located in Kula, which has been previously sabotaged by us and the second in Rumuekpe, both belonging, we believe, to the Shell Petroleum Development Company."

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The latest attack came barely a week after the MEND vowed new attacks to prove it had not collected money from the Nigerian government.

The head of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Abubakar Yar'Adua, had told a parliamentary hearing July 22 that the firm paid $12 million in protection fees to Niger delta fighters to enable the repair of a damaged key crude supply pipeline.

Violent attacks and kidnappings targeting oil companies are a frequent occurrence throughout the Niger Delta.

Some of the armed groups say they are fighting for greater autonomy and an increased share of oil revenues for the region, while other attacks are carried out by criminal gangs seeking ransoms.

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