Medeshi Sept 16, 2008EU plans mission to tackle piracy off Somalia
By Tony Barber in Brussels
European Union foreign ministers yesterday approved plans for a possible naval mission to the Horn of Africa to crack down on pirates causing mayhem to maritime traffic off Som-alia's coast.
Ministers of the 27-nation bloc ordered that a coordination unit be set up to support protection and surveillance operations led by EU member states off the Somali coast.
EU governments have become frustrated with the lawlessness in the Gulf of Aden, which lies off Somalia's northern coast and is an important sea route for European commerce flowing to and from the Suez Canal.
The European plan came as the United Nations appealed yesterday for help to protect world food programme shipments in Somalia's waters, warning of shortages if no country came forward.
Pirates have launched at least 50 attacks since January in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean, selecting targets from cargo ships and chemical tankers to fishing boats, yachts and vessels bringing humanitarian aid to Somalia.
One European shipping company said last week that it had paid a $1m (€705,000, £550,000) ransom for the release of a cargo vessel and its crew, a practice that supporters of a harder line say has encouraged piracy.
The International Maritime Bureau, a private non-profit organisation that specialises in piracy and maritime crime, says seizures of ships and sailors are running at their highest level since 1991, when it first started to collect piracy data.
Insurance premiums for cargo ships intending to pass through the Gulf of Aden have soared tenfold over the past year.
EU foreign ministers said they "deplored the upsurge in acts of piracy and armed robbery off the coasts of Somalia" and had given the green light to "a possible EU military naval operation".
Any EU action would be taken within the framework of United Nations Security Council resolution 1816, which the 15 council members unanimously adopted in June.
The resolution allowed states co-operating with Somalia's transitional government to enter Somali territorial waters for six months and use "all necessary means" to suppress acts of piracy and armed robbery at sea.
Somalia has lacked a functioning central government since the overthrow in 1991 of Mohamed Siad Barre, the late leader. The EU has already adopted a higher-profile role in efforts to promote security in Africa, having deployed a 3,700-strong peacekeeping force in eastern Chad this year to protect refugees from the conflict raging in Sudan's Darfur region.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008
