[*This article was original published in the May 2013 issue of Marine Matters. It is reprinted here with the permission of the publisher, Mr. Aldert van Nieuwkoop.] Piracy has been a fact of the maritime world since ancient times. Merchantships are the products, conveyors and producers of great wealth. They […]
Piracy
38 posts
Moves to incorporate the rights of detained Somali children suspected of working with pirate groups into ship security standards, have received a cautious response. Canada’s Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative is spearheading the move, in discussion with the shipping and maritime security industries (see IHS Maritime Fairplay, 6 June 2013). […]
In an article published by Fairplay Magazine, entitled “Target: Child Pirates,” author Girjia Shettar explores the work being done by the Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative and the Dalhousie Marine Piracy Project (DMPP) on the phenomenon of child maritime piracy. It is likely no coincidence that the countries which are […]
In March 2011, Indian naval forces operating in the Arabian Sea captured the Mozambique-flagged fishing vessel Vega 5. Somali pirates had kidnapped the trawler’s original crew several months earlier. They subsequently refurbished the stolen craft into an operationally significant ‘mothership’. Of the 61 marauders who were arrested during the Indian […]
The Child Soldiers Initiative, directed by Dr. Shelly Whitman at Dalhousie University, has released a groundbreaking report entitled Children and Youth in Marine Piracy: Causes, Consequences and the Way Forward. The report can be downloaded from their website under Publications or by going directly to the document here. The report […]
On 23 March, Jeremy Binnie, Jane's Defence Weekly Middle East/Africa Editor in London, reported that the EU had expanded the area of operations for the EU Naval Force (EUNAVFOR) counter-piracy mission to include Somali coastal territory and internal waters. Binnie’s opinion is that EUNAVFOR would attempt to “disrupt pirate logistics […]
The Foreign Affairs Committee (FAC) of the British parliament has published its tenth report, entitled “Piracy off the coast of Somalia.” You can read the report here. The report notes that, while the establishment of the safety transit corridor has made the Gulf of Aden reasonably safe, their concentration of effort […]
For some time there has been a debate over whether or not there is a connection between Somali pirates and the militant group known as al Shabaab, which has connections with al Qaeda. A news article carried by Reuters, cites John Steed, the principal military adviser to the U.N. special […]
Following the warning published in MarineLink.com on Thursday 24 March that the trend in the use of violence by pirates would escalate into a small war, a major development occurred that has added new credibility to this alarm. The Economic Times carried an article on 18 April, entitled “Somali pirates […]
*Moderator’s Note: This article was posted on Defence iQ on 30 March. The first paragraph is reproduced here, along with a link the remainder of the article, with the permission of the editor. Policy is the player The EU’s response (Operation ATALANTA) to Somali Piracy under the Common Security and […]