Nigeria chafes at tougher U.S. air security rule

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab in a booking photo released by the U.S. Marshals Service on December 28, 2009.

ABUJA (Reuters) - Nigeria urged the United States on Tuesday to reconsider its decision to require tighter security for Nigerian air travelers in the wake of the botched bombing of a Detroit-bound airliner.

Its foreign minister, in a meeting with the U.S. ambassador to Africa's most populous nation, called the tougher measures "an unacceptable New Year's gift."

Since Monday, passengers flying from Nigeria to the United States must undergo the same checks as people from Iran, Afghanistan and Cuba.

The procedures follow the Christmas Day bombing attempt on a U.S. airliner blamed on Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who U.S. officials believe was trained by al Qaeda in Yemen.

"Listing Nigeria on the second tier of countries for security measures in the U.S. is an unacceptable New Year's gift," Foreign Affairs Minister Ojo Maduekwe told reporters after meeting with U.S. ambassador Robin Sanders.

"We told her that we want the U.S. government to look at this again."

The U.S. list includes passengers traveling from or through nations listed as "state sponsors of terrorism" -- Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria -- as well as Afghanistan, Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia and Yemen.

Nigeria, which has launched a rebranding campaign to shed its image for corruption, said Abdulmutallab's behavior should not be a yardstick for judging the country's 140 million residents.

"Listing Nigeria is not helpful, it is counterproductive. Any concern they have could have been quietly addressed," Maduekwe said.

Abdulmutallab, 23, has been charged with trying to blow up Northwest Airlines flight 253 as it approached Detroit from Amsterdam on December 25 with almost 300 people on board. He transferred to that flight from a KLM flight from Lagos.

The son of a respected banker from northern Nigeria, he was educated at a boarding school in Togo before studying engineering at University College, London and doing a masters degree in Dubai. He also took study trips to Yemen.

Nigeria, along with other countries including the Netherlands, Britain and Canada, will start using full-body scanners at its international airports to try to prevent such a security breach happening again.

Nigeria, Africa's biggest energy producer and sub-Saharan Africa's number two economy, has already received four body scanners from the United States and has asked for 20 more to be used at its Lagos and Abuja airports.

(Writing by Randy Fabi; Editing by Michael Roddy)