news.com.au From a correspondent in Port Harcourt, Nigeria May 4, 2003

HUNDREDS of hostages have left the offshore oil rigs where striking Nigerian oil workers held them captive for weeks - signalling a peaceful end to the standoff. Some essential staff would remain behind on the four oil-drilling platforms, but "everyone else, they are departing in phases over (today) and the weekend," said Guy Cantwell, spokesman for rig owners Transocean Inc, based in Houston.

The evacuation "is continuing and we are going to do it as quickly as we can", he said.

Many of the 170 Nigerian and 97 expatriate hostages - which included 35 Britons, 17 Americans and two Canadians - travelled together with their 100 captors on boats and helicopters to port cities around Nigeria's oil-rich southern coast today.

Cantwell said all the expatriate workers had already left the installations, 40km off Nigeria's southern coast.

The Nigerian oil workers held their captives since launching a wildcat strike on April 19 over grievances with Transocean's management.

Company officials and the striking workers' representatives negotiated the release yesterday, after which the first captive was soon freed.

The strikers have demanded the reinstatement of fired workers and that they be transported to the rigs by helicopters, not boats.

Their principal concerns will be addressed at a later date, according to a communique issued after yesterday's talks.

Sweaty and bedraggled, the released hostages told of threats, tedium and discomfort, but no one was immediately known to have been injured by their Nigerian captors.

"It was tense at the start, but the last few days weren't bad," said Mark Richards, from Portsmouth in the United Kingdom, who arrived at this southern port city in one of at least two ferryboats, each carrying about 20 people. "There was some intimidation," said Richards.

"This was not that bad," said Luis Peraza, from Puerto La Cruz, Venezuela, after hopping from a helicopter at Port Harcourt's airport.

"Sometimes it's worse," said Peraza, who has been onboard two other rigs during strikes by Nigerians.

Two other helicopters said to be carrying hostages were seen in Warri, another port town.

A Nigerian labour official who helped negotiate the hostages' freedom said he believed all captives were expected to leave the rigs today.

The rigs are drilling wells on behalf of multinationals Shell and TotalFinaElf.

Sabotage and hostage-takings by community activists, labor groups and thugs demanding compensation for land use and alleged environmental damage are common in the southern Niger Delta, where nearly all of Nigeria's oil is drilled. Hostages rarely are harmed.

Despite the region's vast petroleum stores, most of its residents remain desperately poor. Nigeria is one of the world's largest oil exporters and the fifth-largest producer of US oil imports. The Associated Press

Sat May 3, 2003 02:34 PM ET By Daniel Balint-Kurti

PORT HARCOURT, Nigeria (<a href=reuters.com>Reuters) - The first batch of freed foreign hostages, seized by striking Nigerian oil workers on offshore rigs more than two weeks ago, docked safely at a mainland port on Saturday, witnesses said.

"It was a little difficult but it worked itself out," said a British man in his 30s as he stepped ashore. He declined to give his name as did his colleagues.

The disheveled and grumpy looking former captives walked briskly and crowded into two waiting vehicles which sped off into town. Plans for their onward journey were not clear.

The nearly 100 foreign workers, held captive on four oil rigs since April 16, included 35 Britons and 17 Americans.

Louis Perada, a hostage from Venezuela who was ferried to safety by helicopter earlier, said: "At the beginning it was a little bit apprehensive. But it became normal. You don't expect people who have been living with you for two years to harm you."

At the start of the drama, some hostages wrote in e-mails to their spouses of threats by the strikers to blow up the rigs.

Like the others, Perada was taken to the port city of Port Harcourt. It was unclear which rig he had been on.

Most hostages were ferried to safety on the Susan McCall and the Adams Surveyor. Both boats arrived from the M.G. Hulme, one of four rigs operated by Houston-based Transocean Inc . Some 400 people were working on the rigs when they were seized.

About a dozen paramilitary policemen with semi-automatic weapons and horsewhips kept a small crowd of onlookers at bay.

HOSTAGES, WHAT HOSTAGES?

One of the few Nigerians who traveled with the foreigners denied that the expatriates had been hostages.

"They were not hostages," snapped John Bojor.

The strikers agreed on Friday to free their captives after talks convened by the umbrella Nigeria Labour Congress at the request of Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo.

The junior workers, who blocked rig helipads with cranes and drums to cut access by air, had demanded reinstatement for five sacked union officials by Transocean.

Most local rig workers are members of the NUPENG oil union, which helped negotiate the release of the hostages.

Mystery surrounded the situation on the other rigs, with one port official saying phone calls to the platforms were not being answered. He said he was not sure the strike had been completely called off on all platforms.

The agreement called for the evacuation of all the Nigerian rig workers as well, a large-scale operation requiring the use of boats and helicopters.

A port official said he expected a total of about 65 people, mostly foreigners, to arrive from the Hulme on Saturday.

The Hulme is on contract to TotalFinaElf and the other three are drilling for Royal Dutch/Shell . All are in southern Nigeria's Gulf of Guinea.

• Souza Cruz, one of the five most powerful groups in Brazil, commemorates its centenary by opening in Rio Grande do Sul the largest cutting-edge cigarette factory in Latin America, and whose importance has embraced governors and entrepreneurs in a climate of confidence which, four months into the Workers Party government, ranges from the particular to the general

BY GABRIEL MOLINA granma

PORTO ALEGRE.— The centenary of the powerful Souza Cruz (SC) cigarette company has had an unexpected result: the coming together of the federal government and Brazilians of one state with an entrepreneurial interest, which has revealed itself as a common one, and goes far further.

Statements from key Brazilian representatives at the opening of the giant cigarette factory in this city, coinciding with the company’s centenary, opened up promising prospects. Flavio de Andrade, president of Souza Bravo; Germano Ribotto, governor of Rio Grande do Sul, from the opposition PSBD; and PT leader Jacques Wagner, minister of Labor and Employment, representing President Lula, characterized — at least for now — a distinct dynamic in the Brazilian political process, given the chaos created in Venezuela on account of the conflict between the government and the entrepreneurs federation, allied to foreign forces and the opposition, still fresh in people’s memory.

Lula apologized for not attending as he had to receive President Chávez in Pernambuco for a six-hour meeting that day, involving 10 Brazilian and eight Venezuelan ministers; the presidents of PetroBras and the PVDSA; Jarbas Vasconcelos (PMDB), the governor of Pernambuco; and Joao Julio of the PT, the mayor of Recife.

"How I envy you," Chávez told Lulu, according to the Zero Hora daily, "because with the political radicalization in Venezuela, it’s almost impossible to meet with governors."

The contemporary plant project was initiated in 1997, in the capital of Rio Grande do Sul, with Antoni Britto, then governor of the state, who fought hard for its construction there. Anthony Garotinho, the subsequent governor and current government minister, continued its work. The project was finally inaugurated during the term of the third governor, Germano Rigotto.

BRITISH TOBACCO COMPANY PRESIDENT PREFERS CUBAN CIGARS

At a lively press conference given by Andrade on the eve of the inauguration, the industrialist announced that the next morning, April 26, the Souza Cruz Company would celebrate its 100th anniversary by inaugurating Latin America’s most modern tobacco plant in the Cachoeirinha municipality, 30 kilometers from Porto Alegre, capital of Río Grande do Sur.

Martin Broughton, president of the British Tobacco Company, informed the press at the inaugural reception that the new plant is the world’s oldest and most modern tobacco production center.

In response to criticisms concerning smoking, Broughton commented that he never smokes cigarettes, only cigars. He enjoys a Cuban cigar at night after a good meal and believes in the Group’s public statement that smoking is a personal matter.

Flavio de Andrade spoke to journalists of his firm’s plans and the difficulties he has had to confront. For example, he underscored the company’s losses due to fraudulent brands coming out of Asian countries. Since 1998, the company has also incurred losses due to contraband from Paraguay and Uruguay. A third of the 150 billion cigarettes sold annually in the country are illegal. For this very reason, not only have producers been hit hard, to the tune of $466 million USD, but so has the state. In the final analysis, smugglers have out-maneuvered the tax office and reduced its income.

On the other hand, the high taxes recommended by the World Health Organization to reduce consumption have produced a doubling of cigarette prices over the last three years. Andrade pointed out that raising taxes doesn’t really solve the health problem associated with smoking, but rather forces consumers to buy the product at lower prices on the black market. Nevertheless, Brazil has displaced the United States as the world’s main cigarette exporter. In 2002, Brazil exported 472 million tons, 26% of Brazil’s export total, in comparison with 185 million tons from the United States, also hit by price rises.

He added the counterbalance to tax increases in Brazil would be to facilitate beneficial negotiations and operations for the Rio Grande do Sur government and the S.C.

THE TREASURY AND PRIVATE ENTERPRISE NEED TO FIGHT CONTRABAND TOGETHER

Andrade also explained the difficulties the company is facing in making an complementary investment of a further 500 million reales (more than $166 million USD), along with federal and state aid, to construct a research center in Rio Grande do Sur. The institution will constitute one of the British corporation’s four most important world research centers.

The recent inauguration of the project in Cachoeirinha, an underdeveloped town in Porto Alegre, involved state participation through the now defunct Enterprises Operation Fund. A new form of investment funding is currently being debated in the Legislative Assembly, which only renounces one part of the future taxation recipe, such as rates on the circulation of merchandise and services.

That aid would serve as an example of the beneficial operations mentioned, given that the new plant’s original project, involving an increased production capacity of 80-100 billion cigarettes annually, was reduced to 45 billion due the previously discussed economic problems. Only a successful campaign against contraband, added Andrade, can bring product production capacity up to its original figure, as there are currently idle capacities in the cigarette-manufacturing complex.

Souza Cruz’s president opened the lavish celebration for 2,000 guests by describing negotiations in progress with Governor Irgotto regarding the awaited funding as "very advanced." While he left his audience in suspense on their reach, he did reiterate his denouncement of contraband, which he called disloyal competition. He highlighted how profits garnered from the taxes collected by the Treasury could be invested in schools, housing and hospitals.

SOUSA CRUZ SUPPORTS LULA PLAN TO PAY TREASURY OVER HALF OF PROFITS

Financial statistics offered by SC on the tax issue are impressive. As one of the top five private Brazilian enterprises, SC makes over 6.1 billion reales annually (some $2 billion USD), of which 3.3 billion goes to the Treasury, over half. The firm employs 4,500 people directly, and 380,000 indirectly.

Andrade noted the common interests between his company and those of the Brazilian government, such as the fight against illegality soon be initiated by the government. He supported Lula’s calls to advance tax, social and educational reforms. He added that the Zero Hunger Program requires the backing of all Brazilians and revealed that Souza Cruz plans to donate 1,200 tons of food per year.

"We going to make the impossible possible, as Lula says," he stated emphatically.

The SC president likewise referred to the group’s concern for the environment, confirmed by the decision to use only 10% of the project surface area for actual factory space taking up only 208 hectares. The remaining area will be used for an ecological park dedicated to regional wildlife preservation.

In his speech, Germano Rigotto, the Rio Grande do Sul governor alluded to by Andrade, stated that he would not measure efforts to transform Souza Cruz’s intentions into reality in his state. He added that the decision would lend continuity to the logic of recent investments by the group in the country.

He also lauded community integration by the SC group, its social and educational programs, highlighting the chain as one of the best articulated and consolidated within the state, operating directly with 45,000 families of small gaucho farmers.

For Rigotto, one of his government’s main actions consists in strengthening existing productive chains and organizing new ones "as a way of overcoming difficulties, integrating efforts, destroying obstacles and promoting a fair repartition of operational results."

GOVERNORS CAN HELP CONSIDERABLY IN THE TRANSFORMATION OF SOCIETY

Rigotto added that he has reinforced his defense of the tax reforms proposed by the federal government, a position to be transmitted to Lula by his labor and employment minister, present at the act. Just before, he stated to the press that state governors could play a large role in aiding the president in the transformation of society.

In his speech, he added that the Tax Reform mechanism would be used in terms of the investment in question as soon as possible. He also stated that actions are being integrated among federal and state public ministries, as well as both security apparatuses, to combat piracy and contraband.

In a brief interview with Granma International, Rigotto characterized as attractive economic and social relations between Cuba and Rio Grande do Sur, a veritable country in extension, population and resources, and asked Andrade to arrange a possible trip to Cuba to that effect.

In relation to the federal giant, Brazil, Minister Jacques Wagner also evaluated for Granma International the theme of Cuba, a country he has visited various times, affirming that the relations of friendship and affection with the Cuban people open up wide-ranging prospects of increasing economic and trade relations.

Addressing the opening event, Wagner highlighted the importance of having attained such an important project, initiated by the state governor in 1997 and concluded by another governor from a different political party, which he described as a display of democratic stability.

On behalf of the Brazilian president, Wagner greeted the president of the British Tobacco Company’s administration council, thanked Andrade for his public commitment to the Zero Hunger Program and expressed his desire for greater support from the SC for this and other social programs.

He also reiterated the government’s commitment to combating contraband cigarettes, drinks and other illegalities.

"I want to give you the good news that the factory’s expansion will be necessary when the fight against contraband begins to show results," he concluded.

TRUST SUBSTITUTES FEARS

In light of the elections four months ago, bringing to power the first leftist politician in Brazil, the events at Porto Alegre represent a tangible climate of trust, as opposed to fear, by the private sector in relation to investment.

Mainstream newspaper headlines have reported on the strength of the Brazilian currency, calling it an excellent sign. At the end of April, the real rose to three to the U.S. dollar.

On April 16, the U.S. news agency AP affirmed from Sao Paulo that hardly anyone now believes that the Brazilian economy will become uncontrollable like that of neighboring country Argentina. It added that last year, the situation in Brazil came close to doing so when investors’ fears over the possibility that da Silva would gain the presidency made the local currency fall by 35% against the dollar, encouraging national and international investors to withdraw thousands and thousands of dollars from the country. The dispatch continued by describing how even the International Monetary Fund is praising the former trade union leader.

No matter what, Lula is facing an imposing challenge. The Economist states that the president has been obliged to modify government employees’ pensions perceived by some as the most generous in the world. Lula is seeking a consensus for tax and other reforms that some persons in his own ranks are unsure of.

Organized crime — fed by fabulous sums from drug trafficking — has declared war in reprisal for the anti-corruption measures.

The authorities have named Fernandinho Baira-Mar as responsible for planting explosives in Rio. He is running his drugs business from prison, using a cell phone. After he was transferred to a higher-security prison, two judges were assassinated in March: Antonio José Machadao Dias from Sao Paulo and Alexandre Martins de Castro, from Espirito Santo.

Meanwhile, observers note how Brazil has taken on a role that corresponds to its importance, filling the vacuum that others have left empty.

Its steps are balanced, yet firm. This Souza Cruz centenary, in the words of its president Flavio de Andrade, "born in Rio de Janeiro but with a Gaucho heart," was impressive and I admired the organizational level, free from any failings. The only thing that I missed was not having seen and heard any samba. Not even that created especially for the occasion by Gilberto Silva. I had to put up with seeing good Irish rock Beatles-style at the Cardápio Cherry Blues. I hope that this isn’t symbolic, Allah willing.

• Fidel participates in an International Solidarity Encounter in Havana’s International Conference center • Representatives of more than 120 trade union organizations from 47 nations sign the call not to admit any military aggression of Cuba

BY ALDO MADRUGA—Granma daily staff writer—

A call to intensify solidarity with Cuba at a time when a real threat of aggression by the world superpower is hanging over the island was signed by representatives from more than 120 trade union organizations from 47 countries participating in an International Solidarity Encounter at Havana’s International Conference Center, presided over by President Fidel Castro.

The document also calls for increased efforts for the release of the five Cuban patriots unjustly imprisoned in U.S. jails, which means diffusing the real reasons behind their heavy sentences in very hard conditions in all parts of the world.

Pedro Ross, general secretary of the Central Organization of Cuban Trade Unions (CTC), welcomed the delegates and expressed gratitude for the solidarity of those who, together with the Cuban people, are raising their voices for a just and dignified peace, against warfare, genocide and the real threat of a fascist global dictatorship, and who oppose the evident intentions of the United States to become the force of "world law and order" and initiate further "liberating crusades" like the one it has just executed against the suffering Iraqi people.

He called on those present as part of the international labor movement, and intellectuals, campesinos and students from all over the world, and the U.S. people in particular, to develop a giant and powerful common front against those current U.S. government aspirations.

Basing his argument on official U.S. State Department documents like Project Cuba and the Helms-Burton Act, Ricardo Alarcón de Quesada, president of the National Assembly of People’s Power, demonstrated how the empire’s obsession to erase the Cuban Revolution from the face of the earth dates back to the very moment of the triumph of the Revolution in 1959, when nothing more than the Agrarian Reform Act had been drawn up, and how, on the outside, its strategy has changed very little since then, and not at all in its essence of hatred.

He stressed that at this time the U.S. government sees itself as the master of the world, with the greatest arsenal of military machinery that the empire has ever owned, as well as the owner of the planet’s major mass media, and is even too brazen to deny that it is employing terrorism against Cuba and will continue to do so.

Honest and impassioned speeches from trade unionists and representatives of solidarity groups from all over the world all expressed the determination to close ranks alongside the Cubans and oppose by all possible means the reach of the destabilizing trap being internationally orchestrated against Cuba and whose objective is to facilitate a military aggression to do away with the system of social justice defended for more than 40 years.

Representatives from trade unions and other organizations in the United States, Ecuador, Mexico, Canada, Zambia, Norway, Trinidad and Tobago, the United Kingdom, Colombia, Spain, France, Austria, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Belgium and Switzerland spoke out at the meeting. "Leave Cuba in peace" was a phrase repeated in most of their messages.

Gloria La Riva, president of the Free the Five Committee in the United States spoke on the efforts underway in that country to inform people of the truth concerning these Cuban patriots and proposed using paid announcements in the main U.S. dailies.

On behalf of the families of the prisoners and all Cuba, Irma Sehwerert, mother of René González, one of the Five, an experienced trade unionist who began her struggles for the workers in a factory in the nation where her son is currently imprisoned, expressed gratitude for all the international moves to free the Five.

She confided that she has suffered much as a mother during the five years that her son and his comrades have been resisting taunts and torture, but at the same time, as a Cuban and revolutionary, has felt a deep pride at the courage of those who, in the very den of the Cuban-American mafia in Miami, in a courtroom filled with its most notorious capos, pointed to them and spoke the truth to their face.

She acknowledged the importance of solidarity to achieve the release of the Five, and called on everyone not to falter in the battle to alert the world to the tremendous injustice being committed against them.

theadvertiser.news.com.au 4may03

PETROL prices are tipped to drop under 80c a litre this week for the first time in seven months.

Unleaded fuel yesterday was down as low as 82.3c, the cheapest since November. This is more than 15c a litre cheaper than the 97.9c peak charged on the eve of Easter a little more than a fortnight ago.

The fall represents a saving of about $9 on filling up a typical family sedan.

The savings could grow, according to experts.

"It is quite possible, at the bottom of the discounting cycle, prices will fall below the 80c mark," RAA spokeswoman Wendy Bevan said.

A combination of factors had pushed petrol prices down in recent weeks, Ms Bevan said.

These included:

 CERTAINTY of oil supply, following the ending of the Iraq war.

 THE end of strikes in Venezuela and a return to full production there.

 A 12.5 per cent increase in the value of the Australian dollar against the US dollar in the past six months.

On Friday the Australian dollar was at US63.15c, the highest level in three years. These factors had combined to force the wholesale price down 2c a litre last week, with the savings expected to be passed on to the petrol pump from tomorrow.

"This is welcome news for motorists," Ms Bevan said.

"The oil market is now confident that there is a plentiful, if not over-supply of oil for the short-term.

"The last time the price of crude oil was around $US25 a barrel was November and pump prices went as low as 78.9c a litre. The Australian dollar, however, was not as strong against the US dollar then so it is certainly possible for prices to fall below 80c again."

Motor Trade Association executive director Ian Horne agreed.

"With all the factors in place, there is no reason why unleaded fuel prices couldn't fall below 80c," he said.

"How long they would stay that low, however, is another thing."