Dissident shareholders of a largely Irish-owned oil company are to hold an emergency meeting today in defiance of yoga guru Tony Quinn and other directors.

The group of shareholders in International Natural Energy (INE) is holding an egm in Dublin after directors postponed an agm at short notice. The directors told shareholders last Friday they were cancelling the agm because members were being subjected to threats and intimidation.

The company has earned hundreds of millions of euro in revenues from oil wells since 2005 but has never paid a dividend. The agm is the first in 18 months.