Somali Pirates Shift Location Of Their Activities

April 16, 2009 - PRLog -- Up to five pirates were shot in clashes between the Somali pirates, Americans and French patrols, in two separate incidents over the weekend. President Barak Obama sanctioned the attack in an attempt to rescue an American captain held captive in a life boat.

Speaking from the central pirate lair in Somalia’s eastern coast, one of the pirates says “We shall revenge". Some fear the return of the throat cutting pirates of old.

The current wave of Somalian pirate incidents has been censured by the United Nations Special Representative for Somalia, Ahmedou Ould Abdallah. “Piracy is being carried out up to 900 kilometers from the coast.”

Six more ships have been hijacked this past week. Favourable weather conditions seem to have allowed the pirates to change their area of operation, as they work even further off shore.

While the international naval presence in the area displays solidarity, it appears have make little difference to the pirate’s activities. The area off the coast of Somalia and Kenya and the Gulf of Aden equals more than 1.1 million square miles, which is the size of the Mediterranean and Red Sea combined. The navy ships heavily patrol shipping corridors in the Gulf, where up to 50 ships a day bottleneck the entrance to the Red Sea.

In support of Somalia, the League of Arab States, United Nations, African Union, Organization of Islamic Conference and the European Union’s European Commission are gathering on April 23rd. They will address the problems of security and the root causes of the piracy. Somalia has had no functioning central authority for just on two decades. Piracy has surfaced as the only viable business. The real answer to the piracy problem would basically require the rebuilding of a nation. A price tag no one is prepared to pickup right now.

Piracy doubled in 2008, with 111 Somali attacks reported. These accounted for one third of all piracy around the globe. It is estimated the pirates have collected millions of dollars in ransom last year. These they significantly invested in improving their equipment. The pirates now concentrate on targeting container ships. It is thought that more Somali clans who were not involved in the piracy before, are now adding to the ‘gold rush’.

Acting deputy administrator of the federal Marine Administration, James Capiniti, says “Almost one-third of 1 percent of all the vessels travelling the Gulf are sea-jacked.” As piracy influences all the shipping in the region, it hikes up the cost of international trade, at a point where global recession is drastically slowing the volume of trade. Europe is hid the hardest, as more than 80% of product which is shipped through the Gulf of Aden has European destinations.

In a recent interview, John Patch, an associate professor for strategic intelligence at the US Army War College and a retired Navy surface warfare officer and career intelligence officer, said. "There's quite a lot of hype involved. World opinion is often driven by passion, incidents of the moment and US pride. The data behind the actual seizures is very varied. The naval task force in the Gulf of Aden escorts daily many ships with safe passages. You need to compare the number of piracy incidents to the actual safe passages and you'll see that the instances are still very low." The first American flag flying ship has been pirated since the early eighteen hundreds.

Somali pirates currently hold eighteen ships and more than 250 hostages.



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