The Nigerian Navy said it has discovered six new illegal refineries with combined capacity to refine four million litres of crude oil daily in Alakiri, Asari Toru local government area of Rivers state, Leadership reports.

Executive officer of the Nigerian Navy Ship (NNS) Pathfinder Port Harcourt,Capt. Victor Choji, disclosed this while destroying one of the illegal refineries yesterday in Alakiri, Asari-Toru. “The refinery (in Alakiri) has capacity to produce one million litres of refined petroleum products daily, while the five other refineries have production-capacity of three million litres daily,” he said.

Choji said the refineries were discovered through intensive intelligence gathering and undercover operations by naval troops. He said the navy deployed swamp buggy machines to crush the metallic storage and its pipelines to make it is impossible for operators of the refineries to rehabilitate the facilities.

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