Medeshi 19 Nov, 2008Somalia's pirate kings
DHOWS rest on a white sand beach in front of a few dozen ramshackle homes. A creek cuts inland, traced by a dirt road that runs to a craggy fishing settlement five kilometres away. Until recently Eyl was a remote and rundown Somali fishing outpost of 7000 people. Now, thanks to some spectacular ocean catches, it is a booming mini-town, awash with dollars and heavily armed young men, and boasting a new notoriety: piracy capital of the world.
(Photo: These eight Somali pirates have been handed over to the Kenyan authorities by the British Royal navy , but there are hundreds more enjoying the spoils of their crimes)
At least 12 foreign ships are being held hostage in the waters off Eyl in the Nugal region, 300 nautical miles south of Africa's Horn, including a Ukrainian vessel, the MV Faina, loaded with 33 tanks and ammunition that was hijacked in September.
The captured ships are being closely watched by hundreds of pirates aboard boats equipped with satellite phones and GPS devices. Hundreds more gunmen provide back-up on shore, where they incessantly chew the narcotic leaf qat and dream of sharing in the huge ransoms that can run into millions of dollars.
In a war-ravaged country where life is cheap and hope is rare, each successful hijack brings more young men into the village to seek their fortunes at sea. Somalia has been wracked by war for almost 20 years since its central government collapsed.
"Even secondary school students are stopping their education to go to Eyl because they see how their friends have made a lot of money," Abdulqaadir Muuse Yusuf, deputy fisheries minister for the Puntland region, says.
The entire village now depends on the criminal economy. Hastily built hotels provide basic lodging for the pirates, new restaurants serve meals and send food to the ships, while traders provide fuel for the skiffs flitting between the captured vessels.
The pirate kingpins who commute from the regional capital, Garowe, 160 kilometres west, in new four-wheel-drive vehicles splash their money around. When a ransom is received the gunmen involved in hijacking the particular ship join in the splurge, much to the pleasure of long-time residents.
Jaama Salah, a trader, said that a bunch of qat can sell for $65, compared with $15 in other towns. Asli Faarah, a tea vendor, said: "When the pirates have money I can easily increase my price to $3 for a cup." Somalis in the diaspora — especially in Kenya, the United Arab Emirates, Canada and Britain — finance the pirate gangs and keep a large chunk of the ransom money, estimated at more than $US50 million ($A77 million) this year alone. Bosasso is the capital of the lawless enclave of Puntland, which has an annual budget of only $A35 million. But the gangs of gunmen sometimes split hundreds of thousands of dollars between them.
In the region's bigger towns, such as Garowe and Bosasso on the Gulf of Aden coast, a successful hijack is often celebrated with a meal and qat-chewing session at an expensive hotel.
One successful pirate based in Garowe, Abshir Salad, said: "First we look to buy a nice house and car. Then we buy guns and other weapons. The rest of the money we use to relax."
The pirates appear to have little fear of arrest by the weak administration, which many suspect of involvement in the trade. By spreading the money to local officials, chiefs, relatives and friends, the pirates have created strong logistical and intelligence networks, and avoided the clan-based fighting that affects so much of the rest of the country.
An entire industry has grown up around refitting the vessels used by the gangs. When hostages are brought in, they must be fed during their long period in captivity. Some restaurants in Eyl have reportedly been established especially for this purpose. New villas are springing up and the streets are filled with expensive cars, but the pirates have been careful to re-invest some money in faster boats with long-range radios and satellite navigation systems.
This technology has allowed them to extend their operations deep into the Indian Ocean, while once they were only a coastal threat and large vessels could avoid them simply by remaining out to sea.
Eyl is patrolled by numerous militiamen who would threaten any mission to rescue the hostages held in the town. All this takes place in the homeland of Somalia's officially recognised "president", Abdullahi Yusuf.
Holed up in the capital, Mogadishu, where he barely controls a few districts of the city, Yusuf is a national leader in name only.
But the warlord, 73, was president of Puntland between 1998 and 2004. Yusuf comes from the Darod clan, which forms the majority in Puntland. But he is unlikely to have any control over his piratical clansmen. Without their efforts, the enclave's economy would probably collapse.
And though few believe the pirates when they claim to be eco-warriors or marines defending Somali waters from foreign exploitation, their daring and wealth has earned them respect. It has become something of a tradition for successful pirates to take additional wives, marrying them in lavish ceremonies.
Naimo, 21, from Garowe, said she had attended a wedding last month of the sort "I had never seen before".
"It's true that girls are interested in marrying pirates because they have a lot of money. Ordinary men cannot afford weddings like this," she says.
GUARDIAN, TELEGRAPH
At least 12 foreign ships are being held hostage in the waters off Eyl in the Nugal region, 300 nautical miles south of Africa's Horn, including a Ukrainian vessel, the MV Faina, loaded with 33 tanks and ammunition that was hijacked in September.
The captured ships are being closely watched by hundreds of pirates aboard boats equipped with satellite phones and GPS devices. Hundreds more gunmen provide back-up on shore, where they incessantly chew the narcotic leaf qat and dream of sharing in the huge ransoms that can run into millions of dollars.
In a war-ravaged country where life is cheap and hope is rare, each successful hijack brings more young men into the village to seek their fortunes at sea. Somalia has been wracked by war for almost 20 years since its central government collapsed.
"Even secondary school students are stopping their education to go to Eyl because they see how their friends have made a lot of money," Abdulqaadir Muuse Yusuf, deputy fisheries minister for the Puntland region, says.
The entire village now depends on the criminal economy. Hastily built hotels provide basic lodging for the pirates, new restaurants serve meals and send food to the ships, while traders provide fuel for the skiffs flitting between the captured vessels.
The pirate kingpins who commute from the regional capital, Garowe, 160 kilometres west, in new four-wheel-drive vehicles splash their money around. When a ransom is received the gunmen involved in hijacking the particular ship join in the splurge, much to the pleasure of long-time residents.
Jaama Salah, a trader, said that a bunch of qat can sell for $65, compared with $15 in other towns. Asli Faarah, a tea vendor, said: "When the pirates have money I can easily increase my price to $3 for a cup." Somalis in the diaspora — especially in Kenya, the United Arab Emirates, Canada and Britain — finance the pirate gangs and keep a large chunk of the ransom money, estimated at more than $US50 million ($A77 million) this year alone. Bosasso is the capital of the lawless enclave of Puntland, which has an annual budget of only $A35 million. But the gangs of gunmen sometimes split hundreds of thousands of dollars between them.
In the region's bigger towns, such as Garowe and Bosasso on the Gulf of Aden coast, a successful hijack is often celebrated with a meal and qat-chewing session at an expensive hotel.
One successful pirate based in Garowe, Abshir Salad, said: "First we look to buy a nice house and car. Then we buy guns and other weapons. The rest of the money we use to relax."
The pirates appear to have little fear of arrest by the weak administration, which many suspect of involvement in the trade. By spreading the money to local officials, chiefs, relatives and friends, the pirates have created strong logistical and intelligence networks, and avoided the clan-based fighting that affects so much of the rest of the country.
An entire industry has grown up around refitting the vessels used by the gangs. When hostages are brought in, they must be fed during their long period in captivity. Some restaurants in Eyl have reportedly been established especially for this purpose. New villas are springing up and the streets are filled with expensive cars, but the pirates have been careful to re-invest some money in faster boats with long-range radios and satellite navigation systems.
This technology has allowed them to extend their operations deep into the Indian Ocean, while once they were only a coastal threat and large vessels could avoid them simply by remaining out to sea.
Eyl is patrolled by numerous militiamen who would threaten any mission to rescue the hostages held in the town. All this takes place in the homeland of Somalia's officially recognised "president", Abdullahi Yusuf.
Holed up in the capital, Mogadishu, where he barely controls a few districts of the city, Yusuf is a national leader in name only.
But the warlord, 73, was president of Puntland between 1998 and 2004. Yusuf comes from the Darod clan, which forms the majority in Puntland. But he is unlikely to have any control over his piratical clansmen. Without their efforts, the enclave's economy would probably collapse.
And though few believe the pirates when they claim to be eco-warriors or marines defending Somali waters from foreign exploitation, their daring and wealth has earned them respect. It has become something of a tradition for successful pirates to take additional wives, marrying them in lavish ceremonies.
Naimo, 21, from Garowe, said she had attended a wedding last month of the sort "I had never seen before".
"It's true that girls are interested in marrying pirates because they have a lot of money. Ordinary men cannot afford weddings like this," she says.
GUARDIAN, TELEGRAPH
Naval patrols will not stop attacks, says Somali PM
Hijacked Saudi tanker anchors off Somalia
Indian navy destroys pirate boat as more ships taken
Govt dismisses Somali Islamists attack threat
Three pirates killed as war stepped up
Regional leaders to discuss Somalia
Somali Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein said naval patrols would not stop piracy and appealed for more help to tackle criminal networks with links beyond the Horn of Africa nation.
The audacious hijack of a supertanker 450 miles off Kenya on Saturday was the latest in a spate of attacks by Somali pirates which has sparked international alarm and threatens to push up the cost of goods and commodities around the world.
Hussein said piracy should be confronted on land and at sea and it would become clearer in the coming months which organisations outside Somalia were involved in hijackings.
“We are very sorry that this piracy problem is not limited only to Somalia but is affecting the whole region, is affecting the world,” he told Reuters in an interview.
“The warship operations alone will not be sufficient. Since there is a piracy network, it means an operational network which includes the sea, the land and also outside the country sometimes,” he said.
The supertanker was seized despite the deployment of a naval force including Nato and European Union members’ ships to protect one of the world’s busiest shipping areas. US, French and Russian warships are also off Somalia.
“I think this is linked to some other organisations. I don’t think that this is only, purely, Somali piracy,” Hussein said. “Criminal groups, definitely ... it is an assumption. But of course in the coming months, definitely, the picture will be more clear.”
Analysts suspect the Somali pirates are being helped by Yemenis, and possibly Nigerians. They fear the spoils may end up funding international terrorist groups, though there is no hard evidence of this.
Analysts say international efforts should, besides sending warships, focus on financial networks recycling the tens of millions of dollars of ransoms paid this year.
“There’s a financial network that needs to tracked down. There needs to be a multi-agency response,” said Jason Alderwick, a maritime defence analyst at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.
Hussein said Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government did not have the means to take on the pirates and called for international help to establish a viable coastguard.
Maritime analysts say foreign warships will have a tough time stamping out piracy because the pirates have shown they can strike over a vast expanse of sea. The area hit by hijackings so far is more than a million square miles. Since hijacking the supertanker, Somali pirates have struck twice in the Gulf of Aden, one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world linking Europe to Asia and the Middle East.
Diplomats say only a solution on the ground in Somalia will eradicate the problem. Islamists control most of south Somalia, feuding, heavily armed clan militias hold sway in many other areas and the weak, Western-backed TFG is in the capital Mogadishu.
Hijacked Saudi tanker anchors off Somalia
Indian navy destroys pirate boat as more ships taken
Govt dismisses Somali Islamists attack threat
Three pirates killed as war stepped up
Regional leaders to discuss Somalia
Somali Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein said naval patrols would not stop piracy and appealed for more help to tackle criminal networks with links beyond the Horn of Africa nation.
The audacious hijack of a supertanker 450 miles off Kenya on Saturday was the latest in a spate of attacks by Somali pirates which has sparked international alarm and threatens to push up the cost of goods and commodities around the world.
Hussein said piracy should be confronted on land and at sea and it would become clearer in the coming months which organisations outside Somalia were involved in hijackings.
“We are very sorry that this piracy problem is not limited only to Somalia but is affecting the whole region, is affecting the world,” he told Reuters in an interview.
“The warship operations alone will not be sufficient. Since there is a piracy network, it means an operational network which includes the sea, the land and also outside the country sometimes,” he said.
The supertanker was seized despite the deployment of a naval force including Nato and European Union members’ ships to protect one of the world’s busiest shipping areas. US, French and Russian warships are also off Somalia.
“I think this is linked to some other organisations. I don’t think that this is only, purely, Somali piracy,” Hussein said. “Criminal groups, definitely ... it is an assumption. But of course in the coming months, definitely, the picture will be more clear.”
Analysts suspect the Somali pirates are being helped by Yemenis, and possibly Nigerians. They fear the spoils may end up funding international terrorist groups, though there is no hard evidence of this.
Analysts say international efforts should, besides sending warships, focus on financial networks recycling the tens of millions of dollars of ransoms paid this year.
“There’s a financial network that needs to tracked down. There needs to be a multi-agency response,” said Jason Alderwick, a maritime defence analyst at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.
Hussein said Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government did not have the means to take on the pirates and called for international help to establish a viable coastguard.
Maritime analysts say foreign warships will have a tough time stamping out piracy because the pirates have shown they can strike over a vast expanse of sea. The area hit by hijackings so far is more than a million square miles. Since hijacking the supertanker, Somali pirates have struck twice in the Gulf of Aden, one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world linking Europe to Asia and the Middle East.
Diplomats say only a solution on the ground in Somalia will eradicate the problem. Islamists control most of south Somalia, feuding, heavily armed clan militias hold sway in many other areas and the weak, Western-backed TFG is in the capital Mogadishu.
(Reuters)
