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Somalia: piracy’s feeding frenzy goes on

The capture of the Maersk Alabama by Somali pirates demonstrates that the cautious optimism expressed by some observers was a bit premature. There is reason to believe that it wasn’t the presence of various naval forces which led to a (temporary) decline of piracy in these troubled waters, but the weather: the north-east monsoon turned Somalian waters into a sea too dangerous for the pirates’ skiffs to operate. Now that the monsoon is over, pirates are back wit h a vengeance — with a slight change in their modus operandi. They seem to have changed their area of operation, the centre of gravity now being the East African coast of Somalia. In all probability, this is indeed a result of the presence of naval forces in the Gulf of Aden. Also, we notice that Somali pirates have widened their area of operations: they are now even attacking ships in the vicinity of the Seychelles.

These new and even more brazen attacks contain several lessons. First, the “gold rush” or — more appropriate in a maritime context — “feeding frenzy,” which started last spring with the attack on the French luxury yacht Le Ponant netting a ransom of $2m, is far from over. In the coastal areas of war-ridden Somalia, piracy still is the only show in town, the only booming economy. Second, in order to curb acts of piracy at sea, naval forces also need to widen their area of operation from the Gulf of Aden to basically the whole of the western part of the Arabian Sea. And third, since we simply do not have the naval assets necessary to effectively patrol such a large area, we have to realise that the root causes of piracy can only be addressed on the land side. Tackling piracy at sea with all those different “rules of engagement”, and all those legal problems with bringing pirates to justice, simply won’t work. — © Guardian Newspapers Limited, 2009

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