Thu, 23 April 11:00 2009

The profits of modern-day piracy

Piracy has overtaken fishing and livestock production as Somalia’s national industry, with pirates seizing a total of 40 ships off the Somali coast in 2008 and taking 75 million euros in ransom money. Four months into 2009, they have already received 38 million euros as a result of their activities.
Consequently there was jubilation – of a kind – on April 12 when the US navy succeeded in freeing Richard Phillips, captain of the Maersk Alabama, taken hostage after pirates tried unsuccessfully to board the cargo ship on April 8. Three pirates were killed during the operation but Captain Phillips escaped unharmed, unlike Florent Lemacon, French owner of a yacht, the Tanit, hijacked on April 4. French commandos stormed the Tanit on April 10, killing two of the five pirates involved and also Florent Lemacon although his wife, their three-year-old child and two friends accompanying them on a round-the-world voyage were unharmed.
Following last week’s rescues and killings, Medecins sans Frontieres stressed that piracy is a symptom of the country’s ills which was poor in the past and is still poorer in the present. Somalia was created by merging former British and Italian territories in 1960 and ten years later it was declared a socialist state with close ties to the Soviet Union by Siad Barre, who remained president until 1991. He was overthrown by the rival clans which are still the bane of the country and since then the country has effectively been without a government. Matters were not improved by the rise of Islamist extremists in 2006.
Sharif Ahmed, the current president who was elected last February, has the backing of the United States, which is anxious to prevent the country falling prey to the Al Shabab militias, radical Islamists linked to Al Qaeda who control part of Mogadishu and Southern Somalia. The efficacy of this backing has yet to be seen and on Monday last week, rebels fired mortars at the aircraft of congressman Donald Payne as he left Mogadishu Airport following a visit to the capital.
The congressman had met government leaders in Mogadishu to seek ways in which the international community could help Somalia. Meanwhile, for countries with ships or private craft plying the Indian Ocean within the reach of the pirates, their principal concern is defending national and commercial interests. Presumably it escapes their notice that the pirates still use the fishing boats that are useless now that their fishing grounds are stripped bare by foreign-owned trawlers. They pay Somalia nothing and in return are devastating one of its few legal sources of income.

Set as favorite

Email this

Comments (0) Add Comment