World grapples with piracy at sea

Shipping and security officials say pirates are exploiting the maritime equivalent of what military officers on land call ungovernable spaces: vast, remote regions made lawless because of failed states, mostly out of the reach of international militaries. They find the ships fairly easy to capture, and many shipping companies are willing to pay lucrative ransoms to free hijacked crews and cargo.

Like the globe’s other piracy hot spot, the narrow Strait of Malacca between Malaysia and Indonesia, the Gulf of Aden is one of the most sensitive choke points in global commerce, a passageway for an array of valuable cargo such as oil, weapons and manufactured goods shuttling between Europe and Asia.

While the stable, comparatively wealthy Southeast Asian countries that line the Malacca Strait have committed their naval and coastal forces to stamping out hijackings and piracy, the Gulf of Aden is bordered by poor or dysfunctional countries like Djibouti, Yemen and particularly Somalia.

“The area is much bigger,” said Rand Corp’s Peter Chalk, author of a study on piracy at sea. “You do not have that kind of regional cooperation now, and you have a huge void of governance in Somalia.”

Shipping consultants have reported skyrocketing insurance premiums for ships passing through the waters between the Horn of Africa and the Arabian peninsula, with some estimating the costs rising as much as tenfold. BGN Risk, a British firm that analyses corporate risk, said the additional costs to the shipping industry could total $400 million per year.

Many international shippers insist that it is not their role to fight pirates. But Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell said some of the blame must fall on the shippers themselves, who have not done enough to protect their cargo. The US Navy says intelligence officials are watching for signs of terrorist involvement in piracy. “Wherever there is big money, you will find terrorists,” said US Navy Vice Adm Bill Gortney.

But military officials and experts also say even a stepped-up naval presence is unlikely to stop the piracy. With more than 20,000 ships estimated to be passing annually through the gulf, US and NATO officials have acknowledged that their 14 allied naval ships off the Somali coast, including those from India and Russia, are simply not enough to provide escorts to all commercial vessels.