Pirates!, modern day pirates

Resurgence of piracy highlights terror risk
Southeast Asia struggles to protect vulnerable waterway

By Kari Huus
Reporter
MSNBC
Updated: 7:44 p.m. ET July 21, 2005

When 35 pirates carrying machine guns and rocket launchers boarded a tanker laden with methane in the Malacca Strait in March, it sent a shudder through the crew, and a ripple of fear from Tokyo to Washington.

The incident marked a resurgence in attacks along one of the world’s most vulnerable and valuable shipping lanes, where things had been relatively quiet following last year's tsunami. It also served as a reminder of the risks to world trade, and of the potential for terrorism in the region.

The attack on the tanker turned out to be routine highway robbery in the strait, whose waters are shared by Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia.

Political obstacles to security
Since early last year, under pressure from the United States and other trading powers, Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia have been struggling to devise a plan for better security in the narrow bottleneck.

Indeed, Adm. Thomas Fargo, head of the U.S. Pacific Command, prompted a flurry of regional security efforts when he told Congress in March 2004 that the military was looking at "putting Special Operations forces on high-speed vessels" in the strait "to conduct interdiction."

Indonesia and Malaysia, which firmly rejected the idea of a U.S. military presence in their waters, have started working, along with Singapore, on building a system of joint patrol, a move lauded by security experts.

In the meantime, however, successful attacks continue mainly because the pirates flee international waters a short distance into the Indonesian archipelago, where Malaysian and Singaporean vessels cannot pursue them.

"If those three countries agree on hot pursuit into each others territorial waters, that would be big progress in terms of cooperation," said Yoichiro Sato, associate professor at the Asia Pacific Center for Security Studies in Hawaii.

But the poor state of Indonesia's military remains a major obstacle to security. By some estimates, only about one-third of its vessels are even seaworthy, says Jeorg Eschenfelder, Southeast Asia editor for the World Security Network. "They have equipment problems, training problems and corruption" to complicate their fight against piracy.

Many of the pirates "are better equipped and trained than the coast guard or navies in the region," he said.

Wealthy Singapore, with its largely Chinese and non-Muslim population, is the most zealous enforcer in the region, because port and maritime services are the lifeblood of the tiny city-state's economy. It also sees the United States as a key ally in a largely Muslim region.

"Singapore is scared of its bigger neighbors, so it is trying to enhance ties with the United States," Sato said. "It actually welcomes a U.S. military presence in the region; for the same reason it invites the Japanese to be in the region with their coast guard or Self Defense Forces.

Outside nations keep eye on the problem

There's no shortage of nations with an interest in Malacca's security, but their involvement remains marginal.

Japan would like to help police the strait, and it's under pressure from shipowners to help after pirates abducted threw crew members of a Japanese-owned tugboat in March. In its most recent move, in June, Tokyo sent a coast guard patrol vessel to the region.

However, lingering sensitivities over Tokyo's World War II atrocities in Southeast Asia dictate that Japan cannot send military vessels or run patrols, and that its role will remain largely financial and technical. Even the coast guard vessel met with some resistance, and instead is being billed as a training vessel. Under Japan's own postwar constitution, it cannot export arms.

For now, Washington has taken a softer stand on the Malacca Straits, taking the lead of the newly appointed chief of the U.S. Pacific Command, Adm. William Fallon, who has said Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore can do a "very adequate" job of safeguarding security.

Support from the United States is focused on providing technology, reconnaissance data and running joint exercises to bolster local patrols.

Sato said risks in the straits may also prompt the United States to lift restrictions on military sales to Indonesia that were imposed in the 1990s because of alleged human rights abuses by its military.

Meanwhile, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld held security meetings in Southeast Asia in June, urging coastal nations to work together on Malacca security, a reminder that the United States is standing by to protect its interests.

But in the nightmare scenario, terrorists using the methods of modern-day pirates seize a gas tanker and use it as floating bomb, which experts say could explode with the force of a small nuclear weapon. The damage from such an attack could go well beyond the immediate bloodshed and environmental damage, hobbling U.S. trade with Asia and cutting off essential energy supplies shipped through the narrow channel to China, South Korea and Japan.

"The threat is real and urgent," Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong told a regional security conference in June. "We know that terrorists have been studying maritime targets across the region."

Each year, 60,000 ships ply the Malacca Strait, carrying about half of the world's oil and one-third of its trade. That includes nearly all of U.S. imports from China and 80 percent of the oil used by economic powers Japan, South Korea and Taiwan.

In the 600-mile long passageway, just 20 nautical miles across at its narrowest, slow-moving cargo ships are easy to spot and chase down. Many of the attacks succeed because pirates can quickly retreat into national waters where pursuers cannot follow, and hide among the myriad islands in the region. As shipping through the strait increases rapidly, security only gets harder to provide.

While the stakes are high for the United States and its trading partners, there are limits to American security efforts since the piracy is not in U.S. waters.

Many attacks not reported

In 2004, there were 37 attacks in the Malacca Straits reported to the Piracy Reporting Center of the Malaysia-based International Maritime Bureau, making it one of the most dangerous stretches of water on earth, according to the organization.

The number dropped sharply after the tsunami hit the region on Dec. 26, presumably because of the large presence of foreign military vessels helping with aid. But in mid-March, after their departure, the maritime bureau said violent ship attacks were on the rise again.

And reported attacks, experts agree, are only a sampling of reality, since shipping companies are reluctant to report the incidents, which can cause costly delays or push up insurance rates.

"There are more and more attacks that go unreported," said Gal Luft, director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security. "People in this industry ... admit that for them economically it doesn’t make sense."

"They don’t care about the geopolitical implications or the social cost of all this," Luft said.

As it is, the Lloyd’s and London insurance market Joint War Committee, an advisory body to insurers, reclassified the Malacca Strait as a war risk area this month — a signal to the insurance industry that regional conflict and the rising level of violence merit higher premiums for ships passing through the region.

The attacks vary. Some pirates target the contents of ship safes; others kidnap crew members for ransom, while others target high-value cargo.

One of the most recent reported incidents, technically in the Singapore Strait at the far southern end of the passage, took place on July 13, according to the International Maritime Bureau: "Six pirates armed with long knives and wearing black facemasks boarded a tanker under way via a speedboat. They took hostage two duty crewmembers and tied them up."

After destroying the ship's communication equipment, the bureau said, they took three more crew members and the captain hostage, and stole the ship's cash and other property.

More firepower

The attacks are increasingly sophisticated, employing military-style weapons and strategies.

"Because of the kinds of weapons they're carrying, they're use of flack jackets, a high degree of competency and tactical prowess ... it seems apparent that they’ve had some relatively vigorous training," says Rupert Herbert-Burns, director of intelligence and research for the Washington, D.C.-based arm of Lloyds Marine Intelligence group in London.

"We’re talking about criminals here … with more sophistication, scales of ammunition, adequate use of command and control, the use of multiple boats and the ability to seize precisely the right ship," he said.

So far, the link between these criminals and terrorism remains largely a matter of speculation and concern. Skeptics say that the United States and its allies exaggerate the threat as a way to justify asserting themselves in the region.

But there is some evidence that is cause for concern. The separatist group known by the acronym GAM, a group fighting to create an independent Islamic state in Indonesia's Aceh province, uses piracy to raise money for its long-running battle.

Of more concern is the Islamist extremist group Jemaah Islamiyah, which was behind the October 2002 nightclub bombing in Bali that killed more than 200 on the popular Indonesian resort island. Jemaah Islamiyah is known to operate throughout Southeast Asia, and has had at least some contact with al-Qaida.

Last August, Indonesia's intelligence chief, A.M. Hendropriyono, wrote in an opinion piece in the Jakarta Post that "senior Jemaah Islamiyah terrorists now in detention have admitted that attacks on Malacca shipping traffic have been contemplated in the recent past." He didn't provide any additional detail in the article, which argued for more cooperation in the region and help from the United States.

An attack in 2004, the details of which remain in dispute, also prompted intense focus on the potential for terrorism in Malacca. As it was reported, hijackers with assault rifles took over a chemical tanker, disabled the ship's radio, took the helm and apparently experimented with steering the vessel at various speeds, an incident that prompted comparisons with the Sept. 11 suicide bombers flight training.

Somali pirates free hijacked U.N. aid ship
NAIROBI, Kenya (Reuters) -- Somali pirates freed a ship carrying U.N. food aid early Friday, two days after seizing it in the latest hijacking off the anarchic country's dangerous coast, the world body said.

Six gunmen stormed the MV Miltzow freighter Wednesday as its cargo of 850 tons of food aid was being offloaded in the port of Merka, and forced it to sail down the coast to Barawa.

The hijacking came 10 days after pirates released another ship laden with U.N. World Food Program aid, the MV Semlow, which they seized at sea and held for nearly 100 days.

But quick negotiations by the contractor hired by WFP to deliver the food and an official from Barawa, 100 miles (160 kilometers) southwest of the capital Mogadishu, secured the release of the Miltzow, its cargo and crew of one Ugandan and seven Kenyans.

"The ship has been released, and they started negotiating yesterday," WFP spokeswoman Anja du Toit said.

"The only thing we know is that the hijackers demanded a ransom of $20,000, but we don't know if that has been paid."

She said WFP did not and would not pay the ransom.

The Indian Ocean waters off Somalia are among the most dangerous in the world. The Horn of Africa nation of 10 million has had no proper government and no one to patrol its seas since 1991.

Pirates in armed speedboats typically race alongside slower-moving ships, fire on them, then board and take control at gunpoint.

Reacting to the recent spate of attacks on ships, Somalia's interim government condemned "the culture of piracy by freelance militias who are plundering the Somali coastline."

After its release, the Miltzow sailed back to Merka to unload 400 tons of rice, maize and vegetable oil still left on board. It was sent to help 78,000 people suffering from hunger and violence in the nearby Jilib district.

"Everybody [on board] is fine, and she is back in Merka," said Inayet Kudrati, director of the Motaku Shipping Agency based in Mombasa, Kenya.

Three ships owned by Motaku, including the two carrying U.N. food aid, have been hijacked in the last three months. One, seized with its crew of nine Kenyans and one Sri Lankan over the weekend, is still being held by pirates, he said.

The risk has prompted the shippers to stop sailing Somali routes until security is established.

The Somali government, struggling to establish authority at home, pleaded for international help watching its coast and financing and training its own coast guard.

"[Piracy] is a serious and dangerous new phenomena that is unfolding on the high seas of Somalia and is in fact a threat to all maritime vessels from the Red Sea to the southern tip of the Indian Ocean," it said.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/africa/10/14...reut/index.html

As I remember, a Taiwanese fishing vessel with Filipino fishermen were also hijacked last month.

It's quite difficult to negotiate with these hijackers via country to country protocol because Somalia has no government at the the moment.

Those pirates and hijackers were probably elements that belong to one of the warlords that dominate Somalia. It is one of their revenue making scheme to survive.

My brother is a seaman on board a bulk carrier plying the African coast. Pirates are a constant threat to them but they have learned to fight back even if the ship principals didn't allow them to have guns. They have now 4 Rottweilers who alert them when pirates start to clamber up the hull. The sailors then drop huge nuts and bolts on the climbing pirates. The technique is to hit the pirates while they're climbing up the ship when they cannot use their guns. Now, the pirates have identified their ship to be a difficult target and have looked to other easier pickings.

Damn, a 10-kilo steel bolt can surely crack any pirate's head.

filipino initiative at work

Ha! You forgot the slingshots and arrows Tondo-gang style! European officers were quite astonished with such innovations.

Link to weekly piracy reports:

http://www.icc-ccs.org/prc/piracyreport.php

Cruise ship repels Somali pirates

A cruise ship sailing off Somalia has beaten back gunmen in speedboats who opened fire on it in an apparent pirate attack which terrified passengers.

At least two boats closed in on the Seabourn Spirit, firing automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades at the cruise liner.

But crew took evasive action, repelling the attackers without returning fire.

One crew member was lightly injured in the early-morning incident in waters notorious for pirate attacks.

'Rocket hit ship'

The Bahamian-registered ship was carrying 302 passengers and crew, most of them are believed to be Americans as well as some Britons.

"My daughter saw the pirates out our window," passenger Edith Laird from Seattle in the US told the BBC News website in an e-mail from the ship.

"There were at least three RPG that hit the ship, one in a stateroom four doors down from our cabin," she said.

------
3 rpgs hit the ship! damn lucky passengers..

BBC

Crazy Pirates!

With Americans and Britons onboard, it's like they're inviting disaster on themselves. In a couple of weeks you will hear a multi-national Task Force being created to secure that coast. Similar to what is being done now at the Malacca Strait against piracy and that in South America against illegal drug trades.

http://pdff.sytes.net/index.php?showtopic=2478

Nov 7, 7:21 PM EST

Ship Blasted Pirates With Sonic Weapon

By JOHN PAIN
AP Business Writer



MIAMI (AP) -- The crew of a luxury cruise ship used a sonic weapon that blasts earsplitting noise in a directed beam while being attacked by a gang of pirates off Africa this weekend, the cruise line said Monday.

The Seabourn Spirit had a Long Range Acoustic Device, or LRAD, installed as a part of its defense systems, said Bruce Good, a spokesman for Miami-based Seabourn Cruise Line. The Spirit was about 100 miles off Somalia when pirates fired rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns as they tried to get onboard.

The subsidiary of Carnival Corp. was investigating whether the weapon was successful in warding off the pirates, he said. The ship's captain also changed its course, shifted into high speed and headed out into the open sea to elude the pirates, who were in two small boats, he said. He had no further details.

Device maker American Technology Corp. said earsplitting "bangs" were directed by trained security personnel toward the pirates. That, combined with ship maneuvers, caused the attackers to leave the area, the company said.

The LRAD is a so-called "non-lethal weapon" developed for the U.S. military after the 2000 attack on the USS Cole off Yemen as a way to keep operators of small boats from approaching U.S. warships.

The military version is a 45-pound, dish-shaped device that can direct a high-pitched, piercing tone with a tight beam. Neither the LRAD's operators or others in the immediate area are affected.

American Technology, based in San Diego, compares its shrill tone to that of smoke detectors, only much louder. It can be as loud as about 150 decibels, while smoke alarms are about 80 to 90 decibels.

The devices have been deployed on commercial and naval vessels worldwide since summer 2003, the company said.


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cool, this is much better than my brother's nuts and bolts weapons - sent him an email of Wushu's post so he can inform his ship principals

http://www.military.com/NewsContent/0,1331...l?ESRC=dod-b.nl

U.S. Navy Seizes Pirate Ship off Somalia
Associated Press | January 23, 2006


DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - The U.S. Navy boarded an apparent pirate ship in the Indian Ocean and detained 26 men for questioning, the Navy said Sunday. The 16 Indians and 10 Somali men were aboard a traditional dhow that was chased and seized Saturday by the U.S. guided missile destroyer USS Winston S. Churchill, said Lt. Leslie Hull-Ryde of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command in Bahrain.

The dhow stopped fleeing after the Churchill twice fired warning shots during the chase, which ended 54 miles off the coast of Somalia, the Navy said. U.S. Sailors boarded the dhow and seized a cache of small arms.

The dhow's crew and passengers were being questioned Sunday aboard the Churchill to determine which were pirates and which were legitimate crew members, Hull-Ryde said.

Sailors aboard the dhow told Navy investigators that pirates hijacked the vessel six days ago near Mogadishu and thereafter used it to stage pirate attacks on merchant ships.

The Churchill is part of a multinational task force patrolling the western Indian Ocean and Horn of Africa region to thwart terrorist activity and other lawlessness during the U.S.-led war in Iraq.

The Navy said it captured the dhow in response to a report from the International Maritime Bureau in Kuala Lumpur on Friday that said pirates had fired on the MV Delta Ranger, a Bahamian-flagged bulk carrier that was passing some 200 miles off the central eastern coast of Somalia.

Hull-Ryde said the Navy was still investigating the incident and would discuss with international authorities what to do with the detained men.

"The disposition of people and vessels involved in acts of piracy on the high seas are based on a variety of factors, including the offense, the flags of the vessels, the nationalities of the crew, and others," Hull-Ryde said in an e-mail.

Piracy is rampant off the coast of Somalia, which is torn by renewed clashes between militias fighting over control of the troubled African country. Many shipping companies resort to paying ransoms, saying they have few alternatives.

Last month, Somali militiamen finally relinquished a merchant ship hijacked in October.

In November, Somali pirates freed a Ukrainian ore carrier and its 22 member crew after holding it for 40 days. It was unclear whether a US$700,000 ransom demanded by the pirates had been paid.

One of the boldest recent attacks was on Nov. 5, when two boats full of pirates approached a cruise ship carrying Western tourists, about 100 miles off Somalia and fired rocket-propelled grenades and assault rifles.

The crew used a weapon that directs earsplitting noise at attackers, then sped away.

Somalia has had no effective government since 1991, when warlords ousted a dictatorship and then turned on each other, carving the nation of 8.2 million into a patchwork of fiefdoms.

Piracy attacks drop in 2005 but Iraq hotspot emerging

KUALA LUMPUR -- High-seas pirate attacks fell last year amid enhanced vigilance but Iraq emerged for the first time as a new piracy hotspot with the waters off Indonesia remaining the most dangerous in the world, an international watchdog reported.

The International Maritime Bureau (IMB) said the total number of piracy attacks worldwide dropped to 276 last year, from 329 in 2004, the lowest number reported to its Piracy Reporting Center since 1999.

Indonesian waters, with almost 30 percent of the world's attacks, were the most treacherous despite a drop in attacks to 79, from 94 the year before.

Attacks in the notorious Strait of Malacca also fell significantly to 12, from 38 in 2004, prompting the IMB to credit governments for increased patrols aimed at curbing piracy.

Attacks also fell in waters off Malaysia, Thailand, Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia, Haiti, Nigeria and Guinea, it said.

"The IMB attributes the welcome drop in attacks to increased awareness and anti-piracy

watches by shipmasters in risk prone areas, coupled with an increase in law enforcement patrols and increased pressure on certain governments to act," it said in a report released in London late Monday.

The IMB noted a surge in activity in some piracy-prone regions, especially Tanzania, Vietnam and lawless Somalia, where heavily-armed pirates operated from far out to sea.

Iraq stood out "as a new world piracy hotspot," with 10 attacks in 2005 after none the year before.

"Opportunists whose main motivation is robbery and financial gain, and who use extreme violence towards crews in most cases perpetrate these attacks," the IMB report said.

Most of Iraq's attacks were on vessels anchored near the Basrah oil terminal and Umm Qasr off the country's southeastern coast, it said.

Anarchy in Somalia spilled into its waters last year, with 35 attacks, compared to just two the year before, making it the second most dangerous place in the world and the most dangerous in Africa, the IMB said.

Pirates armed with guns and rocket-propelled grenades worked off "mother ships" raiding vessels far out to sea and kidnapping crews for ransom.

"With no central government and no national law enforcement infrastructure in the country, there is no local assistance available to the captured ships," the IMB said, adding a warning to ships to remain at least 200 nautical miles from the Somali coast.
The IMB's report said 440 seafarers were taken hostage in 2005 in Somalia, Indonesia and Nigeria, the highest number recorded since 1992 when the Piracy Reporting Center was set up in Kuala Lumpur.

The report said 23 vessels were hijacked last year, the highest number since 2002, and although no crew members were killed, compared to 30 in 2004, 12 were still missing.

Other piracy-prone areas included the waters off Bangladesh, India and the Singapore Straits in Southeast Asia and South Asia, and the Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Cameroon and Ghana in Africa.

Ships had also been warned about the waters off Jamaica, Haiti and Peru, said the report.

http://news.inq7.net/world/index.php?index=1&story_id=64713

The IMB should introduce a security scheme to authorize Merchant ship companies to have their own on board trained security on every merchant ship plying in critical routes like the notorious Malacca Strait.

These trained security personnel is independent from the crew of the Merchant ship, except that they are still under supervision by the ship's master.

On how to legalize this, it should be in a form of an international treaty relevant to the IMB.

That subject matter has been proposed and opposed many times. In fact in the Philippines alone there is a company in Subic offering such managed by former European special forces personnel. But international bodies agreed that it is the obligation of nations covering areas navigated by merchant ships. In line with this, they develop new regulations for the merchant marine industry to adopt. The Crew, Shipmanagement, Port State Authorities and Flag States all have different responsibilities which they needed trainings to perform these. As the report says, a decline in piracy incidents has been observed. In addition to this, countries now are conducting joint operations in patroliing international sealanes.

http://pdff.sytes.net/index.php?showtopic=1653&st=0&#last