Nigeria: facts and figures

Date: 16/11/1995

Size: 357,000 square miles, twice the size of California

Population: 98 million and growing by 3&percent; a year Estimated to reach 200 million by 2025. Divided into more than 250 ethnic groups

Government: Independent since 1960, ruled by successive military regimes

GNP per capita: 250 ecu (1993)

Exports: 9.5 billion ecu (1993), of which 90&percent; is petrol

Debt: 29.4&percent; of Nigeria's export earnings goes to pay interest on the country's foreign debt

EU-Nigeria relations:

1975: First Lomé Convention signed. Nigeria is one of original members. Since then it has been allocated more than 1 billion ecu, two-thirds in grants and the rest in loans

1993: General Sani Abacha seizes power after the army annuls presidential elections. EU suspends military cooperation with Lagos and reviews export licences for defence equipment, bans high-level visits to and from Nigeria, puts visa restrictions on military members of the Abacha government. EIB stops lending money to Nigeria because it has not repaid its debts

1994: EU alters its aid policy to allow money to go through non-governmental organisations only, and not through the government

12 November 1995: Commission suspends development aid to Nigeria

14 November 1995: EU's Africa Working Group recommends banning arms sales to Nigeria and extending visa requirements to civilian members of

the government and their families