July 16, 2007: Piracy around the world is up again,
with 85 attacks in the second quarter of this year, versus 66 in that quarter
last year, and 41 in 2005. Most of the increase is because of increasing civil
disorder in Somalia and Nigeria. So far this year, attacks on ships has more
than doubled in Nigeria, and nearly doubled in Somalia. Indonesia still
accounts for the most attacks, but increased anti-piracy operations there have
caused a decline of 27 percent this year.
Nearly all the piracy is a result of poor policing
in coastal villages and ports. Pirates need a base, and one where the cops are
not intrusive or, best of all, not present at all. Somalia has not had any
government for nearly two decades, and foreign navies are not willing to patrol
Somalia's territorial waters. Ships are warned to stay far away from the Somali
coast, which means the pirates have turned to attacking UN food ships. Another
ploy is to have a larger ship act as a mother ship for speedboats, that can
pursue ships in international waters. The mothership stays within Somali
territorial waters, where foreign navies will not go.
In Nigeria, the government is faced with a growing
rebellion by tribes living along the coast and the Niger river delta. This is
where most of the country's oil is, and the tribes there have not seen much of
the oil money in the last half century. So the criminal gangs have been tapping
oil pipelines, stealing the oil, and buying guns and speedboats. Now they
attack oil company boats that service off shore oil facilities. The oil
workers, especially foreigners, are kidnapped for ransom, and anything worth
stealing on the boats is taken. Larger
vessels are now being attacked, and piracy is growing into a major problem
there.
The most important anti-piracy operation, in the
vital Straits of Malacca, piracy has been just about wiped out.
