On August 31, 2008, a US freelance journalist and filmmaker Andrew Berends and his Nigerian interpreter, Samuel George were arrested at the Nembe waterfront in Port Harcourt the Rivers State capital in the Niger-delta region by men of the Joint Task Force (JTF) codenamed “Operation Flush Out III”, the team joint Nigerian military personnel patrolling the Niger-delta region to, among other things, forestall kidnapping, oil pipeline vandalisation and oil bunkering. Berends was accused of spying and his equipment, including telephones and film were confiscated.

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