Ten Somalis in Germany's first piracy trial in 400 years

[News_Editor]

Ten Somalis in Germany's first piracy trial in 400 years

2010-11-22 21:44:34 GMT+7 (ICT)

HAMBURG, GERMANY (BNO NEWS) -- Ten Somalis are being accused of a pirate attack in the Indian Ocean to mark Germany's first piracy trial in 400 years.

In April, the Somalis, aged 17 to 48, attacked German container MS Taipan around 530 nautical miles east of the Somali coast before the Dutch Navy boarded the vessel, exchanged gunfire with the pirates, and arrested them. The Netherlands then processed their extradition to Germany in June.

The Taipan had 15 crew members on board during the attack, but they managed hide in a safety room and cut the vessel's power. No injuries were reported during the incident, which lasted around 3 and half hours.

The individuals are being charged with attacking maritime traffic and extortionate kidnapping. If convicted, they face up to 15 years in prison.

Since the beginning of last year, over 160 pirate attacks have been reported in the waters off Somalia, while Somali pirates are currently believed to be holding around 23 ships and 500 hostages. In most cases, the crew and the vessels are returned unharmed after a ransom is paid.

According to the International Maritime Bureau, Somali pirates this year have been responsible for 44 percent of the 289 piracy incidents on the world’s seas in the first nine months and carried out 35 of the 39 ship hijackings worldwide

-- © BNO News All rights reserved 2010-11-22

[billd766]

back in the bad old days pirates were mostly hung at the yardarm, hung drawn and quartered or in a few cases they were pardoned and given commissions in the navy to do the same thing to their countries enemies.

Nowadays they get a slap on the wrist and sent home to mummy.

[aussiejosh]

Wouldn't really be fair to hang and quater a bunch of people who are so desperate they are willing to risk their lives on crappy little boats to try and secure some of the economic freedoms we gain through (mostly)honest work.

[billd766]

Wouldn't really be fair to hang and quater a bunch of people who are so desperate they are willing to risk their lives on crappy little boats to try and secure some of the economic freedoms we gain through (mostly)honest work.

You mean risking their lives whilst carrying (and using AK47s, RPG launchers etc) in their daily job of hi-jacking ships and people and holding them to ransom?

A lot of these crappy little boats travel 500 or more km offshore so they may not be so crappy either.

There seems to be no government control or rule of law over there and nobody seems willing to mount an expedition to clear them out and so it will go on and on until somebody does.

[SergeiY]

Why they became pirates? Anyone knows that part of the story?

[otherstuff1957]

Perhaps they're greedy, amoral and care nothing for human life, like..... you know.... pirates?

[endure]

Why they became pirates? Anyone knows that part of the story?

Because they live in a country that hasn't had any form of government since 1991?

[SergeiY]

Why they became pirates? Anyone knows that part of the story?

Because they live in a country that hasn't had any form of government since 1991?

Perhaps they're greedy, amoral and care nothing for human life, like..... you know.... pirates?

for sure probably part in that list of reasons.

Another one is illegal waste dumping and foreign fishing in the waters of Somalia.

As soon as the government was gone, mysterious European ships started appearing off the coast of Somalia, dumping vast barrels into the ocean. The coastal population began to sicken. At first they suffered strange rashes, nausea and malformed babies. Then, after the 2005 tsunami, hundreds of the dumped and leaking barrels washed up on shore. People began to suffer from radiation sickness, and more than 300 died.

Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the UN envoy to Somalia, tells me: "Somebody is dumping nuclear material here. There is also lead, and heavy metals such as cadmium and mercury – you name it." Much of it can be traced back to European hospitals and factories, who seem to be passing it on to the Italian mafia to "dispose" of cheaply. When I asked Mr Ould-Abdallah what European governments were doing about it, he said with a sigh: "Nothing. There has been no clean-up, no compensation, and no prevention."

At the same time, other European ships have been looting Somalia's seas of their greatest resource: seafood. We have destroyed our own fish stocks by overexploitation – and now we have moved on to theirs. More than $300m-worth of tuna, shrimp, and lobster are being stolen every year by illegal trawlers. The local fishermen are now starving. Mohammed Hussein, a fisherman in the town of Marka 100km south of Mogadishu, told Reuters: "If nothing is done, there soon won't be much fish left in our coastal waters."

This is the context in which the "pirates" have emerged. Somalian fishermen took speedboats to try to dissuade the dumpers and trawlers, or at least levy a "tax" on them. They call themselves the Volunteer Coastguard of Somalia – and ordinary Somalis agree. The independent Somalian news site WardheerNews found 70 per cent "strongly supported the piracy as a form of national defence".

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-hari-you-are-being-lied-to-about-pirates-1225817.html

[Ulysses G.]

Why they became pirates? Anyone knows that part of the story?

I'm sure that the usual voices will claim that it is all the West's fault, but it is mostly due to the same old reason - greed.

In the meantime, Somali piracy has metastasized into the country's only boom industry. Most of the pirates, observers say, are not former fishermen, but just poor folk seeking their fortune. Right now, they hold 18 cargo ships and some 300 sailors hostage — the work of a sophisticated and well-funded operation. A few pirates have offered testimony to the international press — a headline in Thursday's Times of London read, "They stole our lobsters: A Somali pirate tells his side of the story" — but Lehr and other Somali experts express their doubts. "Nowadays," Lehr says, "this sort of thing is just a cheap excuse." The legacy of nearly twenty years of inaction and abuse, though, is far more costly.

Read more: http://www.time.com/...l#ixzz16FFzoKLx

Edited November 24, 2010 by Ulysses G.

[siampolee]

sergeiy

Why they became pirates? Anyone knows that part of the story ?

Political pawns in a mindless conflict designed to further the aims of the arms manufacturers and consolidate the stranglehold on the world by the international financiers.

Britain's former chief of the General Staff, Richard Dannatt, has clarified the role of British institutions in world affairs. "uccess can only be achieved if our actions are fully integrated with our government partners in the FCO [Foreign and Commonwealth Office], DFID [Department for International Development] and all the other instruments of national power" (2009).

According to DFID, one of the instruments of national power, "[a]cross the country [somalia], as fighting cuts off the delivery of essential services and a prolonged drought causes widespread crop failure, an estimated 3.76 million people – close to 40 per cent of the population – are thought to require emergency help. In no other country in the world is so large a proportion of the population in need of relief assistance" (2009).

The "Department for International Development boasts of its millions of pounds in aid donations, but it omits the fact that Britain has helped to plunge Somalia into disaster by destroying the Union of Islamic Courts which were recognized under UN Resolution 1725."DFID boasts of its millions of pounds in aid donations, but it omits the fact that Britain has helped to plunge Somalia into disaster by destroying the Union of Islamic Courts which were recognized under UN Resolution 1725. Britain and America supported the warlords of the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) which Ethiopia, under US auspices, sought to establish in Somalia in December 2006.

The TFG was led by warlord Abdullahi Yusuf, whom the Blair government supported with a house, an NHS liver transplant and finance for his militia (Hartley 2008; Campbell 2005).

By 2009, the situation had not improved: Human Rights Watch reported that "[m]ore than 100,000 people almost all of them from Somalia and Ethiopia have arrived by boat along Yemen's coast during the past two years. Most are fleeing war or persecution at home or are in search of work" (HRW 2009). In line with the standard, and breathtaking, hypocrisy of the British rulers, Yemen is now called a terrorist hotbed.

Despite this horror, the media, following the demands of the government, still likes to condemn pirates. Royal Institute of International Affairs analyst Roger Middleton found that "[t]he only period during which piracy virtually vanished around Somalia was during the six months of rule by the Islamic Courts Union in the second half of 2006. This indicates that a functioning government in Somalia is capable of controlling piracy" (Middleton 2008, 3). In that case, if Britain and America really want to end piracy they wouldn't have destroyed the Union of Islamic Courts. Not surprisingly, Britain and America are linked to the pirates who funded none other than Abdullahi Yusuf.

Middleton confirmed:

Puntland, the semi-autonomous region in the northeast of the country, appears to be the base for most pirates in Somalia… The fact that the pirates originate from Puntland is significant as this is also the home region of President Abdullahi Yusuf. As one expert said, "money will go to Yusuf as a gesture of goodwill to a regional leader" – so even if the higher echelons of Somali government and clan structure are not directly involved in organizing piracy, they probably do benefit... Puntland is one of the poorest areas of Somalia, so the financial attraction of piracy is strong. Somalia's fishing industry has collapsed in the last 15 years and its waters are being heavily fished by European, Asian and African ships (2008, 4-5).

This another example of the West's benevolence.

The "Somalia has links with al-Qaeda" thread on which the US is hanging its Somalia ambitions is, at times, embarrassingly thin. In 2010 BBC Africa reported that the TFG "confirmed to the BBC that an Al-Qaeda fighter had been killed, but did not name him and said the government 'would provide evidence later'" (BBC Africa 2010).

http://www.redress.cc/global/tcoles20100401

Edited November 24, 2010 by siampolee