The Pirates of Puntland

Mogadishu: A First Impression

2012-02-27T03:13:00.004-08:00

Lido Beach, Mogadishu

Although I had spent three months in northern Somalia researching my book, I arrived back from my first trip to "the Mog" two weeks ago, a five day trip with my assistant editor Venetia. Mogadishu was a strange experience. Unlike the other parts of Somalia that I had visited, Mogadishu had been a city, not a desert expanse that looks much the same now as it did two decades ago.

For the former dictator Mohamed Siad Barre, the city of Mogadishu was both his greatest achievement and a symbol of that which led to Somalia's ruin. He transformed Mogadishu into one of the jewels of Africa, a cosmopolitan tourist destination in a country that by all rights should have been one of the continent's success stories. But in doing so, he neglected the rest of the country, plowing all of Somalia's limited national income into the capital city, which contained the only universities, hospitals, and real job opportunities. Somalia's diverse clans descended on Mogadishu from all corners of the country, creating an ethnic hotbed that would eventually boil over into the pogroms, ethnic cleansing, and civil war of the early 1990s.

I've often said that there should be a word in the English language for that sense of melancholic nostalgia one sometimes feels for a place or time one has never personally experienced. It's an emotion captured perfectly in Shelly's famous poem, which describes coming across an ancient statue of a long dead king, half buried in the desert sands:

And on the pedestal these words appear:
`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

That's how I feel about Mogadishu; it's a similar sense of lugubrious loss, of tragically vacated potential, that I experience when gazing on the ruins of ancient Rome. The people are living in a modern ruin, every crumbling and bullet-ridden structure a reminder of past... well, not glory, but certainly beauty.

"Everything is 'former' in Mogadishu," a Ugandan soldier commented to me as we passed the derelict national stadium, until recently used as an al-Shabaab training base. All "former"... the former National Theatre, the former Defence Ministry, the former cathedral--a bombed out structure that looks like something out of the French landscape circa 1945. The inhabitants of Mogadishu are living in a corpse of a metropolis, and the people themselves, uneducated and violent, match the deterioration of their surroundings.

Even though Mogadishu has been relatively peaceful since al-Shabaab pulled out of the city last August, our days and nights were punctuated with the occasional sound of mortars, land mind detonations, and gun shots. "Mogadishu music," the locals call it; some Mogadishans, I've heard, can't sleep when out of the country for the lack of it.

The trip went well, though I found staying at the Peace Hotel, one of Mogadishu's few options for foreigners, too expensive and highly constrictive. Highlights included hanging out with a handful of Somalia Report's brave and dedicated Mogadishu reporters, a stroll along the immaculate Lido beach, and a tour with African peacekeepers to the front lines.

One afternoon, we heard what sounded like a loud mortar go off fairly close by, and thought nothing more of it until one of our stringers, who had just been visiting with us, called me to say that he was at the site of a car bombing at the KM4 junction, three kilometres away, dodging bullets from the guns of crazed and panicking government soldiers. 15 people had been killed.

Stay tuned for an upcoming piece I'll be penning for Somalia Report about my AMISOM tour, hopefully within the next week or so.

Linda Nchi: A First Quarter Review

2012-01-18T12:21:00.000-08:00

In my second lengthy analysis piece for Somalia Report, I assess the progress of the Kenyan invasion of Somalia, Operation Linda Nchi, three months in:

Three months have now passed since Kenya launched its invasion of Somalia, codenamed Linda Nchi ("Protect the Country").

Though the invasion appeared to have been in the works for months, its precise timing, in October 2011, was ostensibly determined by a rash of kidnappings in northern Kenya, including the brutal abductions of Briton Judith Tebbutt and Frenchwoman Marie Dedieu.

Provoked by these blatant infringements of Kenyan sovereignty, the untested Kenya army was launched into the muck, literally. Three prongs of invading columns found themselves caught out in the rain, with roads rendered impassable. The Kenyan Defence Forces’ (KDF) primary objectives of taking Afmadow and Kismayo quickly fell by the wayside.

…

Click here for the full article.

Pirate Law 101

2011-12-10T11:56:00.004-08:00

Below is my latest article, an ambitious policy piece on the current state of pirate prosecutions in Kenya. It's also the first piece I've penned for Somalia Report, where I'm taking over as editor in less than a week.

Pirate Law 101
A Short History of Kenya's Pirate Prosecutions

On November 9, 2010, Kenyan High Court judge Mohamed Ibrahim drew intense criticism when he issued a controversial bench ruling ordering the release of nine alleged Somali pirates. Justice Ibrahim’s decision hinged on a perceived contradiction between Section 5 and Section 69(1) of the Kenyan Penal Code, under which all suspected pirates had been charged prior the February 2009 passage of the Merchant Shipping Act (MSA), Kenya’s modern anti-piracy legislation. Critically, the ruling may also spring the cell doors of each of the approximately 50 pirates handed over by international naval forces to Kenyan authorities before the MSA had come into effect. To the masses clamoring to have suspected pirates summarily hung from the yardarm (“We will have to act as our forefathers did when they met pirates,” Russian president Dimitry Medvedev once blustered), a rogue Kenyan judge potenitally setting four dozen of them free on a seeming legal technicality was utterly incomprehensible. It was equally mystifying to other Kenyan judges, and the case is currently under review in the Court of Appeals, where a ruling is expected on December 15.

…

Click here for the full article

It's official

2011-11-17T23:52:00.000-08:00

So, it's official... as of December 15th, I will be taking over as Managing Editor of SomaliaReport.com, replacing current editor Michael Logan. It's a tremendously exciting opportunity; Somalia Report already boasts the most extensive reporting network within Somalia, and I look forward to working with the over one hundred local journalists who regularly contribute to the site.
It's going to be an insanely hectic month as I prepare to leave Toronto for Nairobi, but I undertake the move with the greatest enthusiasm... aided by the fact that I'll be fleeing the Canadian winter for a city with the world's most perfect climate.

Here's the full press release:

Somalia Report is pleased to announce that Jay Bahadur, a Toronto-based freelance journalist and author, will be taking over as Managing Editor as of December 15th. He will be replacing current editor, Michael Logan, who vacates the position to pursue a career as a full-time novelist.

“Jay brings the reporting discipline, respect for the region and the intense curiosity that will guide us into the next phase of our rapid growth,” said Somalia Report publisher, Mr. Robert Young Pelton, the author of a number of books on conflict including the New York Times bestseller “The World’s Most Dangerous Places."

In early 2009, Bahadur traveled on his own to Puntland, Somalia, where he spent three months interviewing pirates, government officials, and militiamen. The result, over two years later, was the first comprehensive book on Somali piracy, published in seven countries to date.

As editor, Bahadur will continue to build and develop Somalia Report’s extensive network of local journalists, with an aim to realizing the website’s potential to be the country’s premiere source for non-partisan and clan-neutral news coverage.

Bahadur will also preside over Somalia Report’s re-launch under a partial subscription model, offering periodic intelligence reports to the diplomatic, NGO, and security communities. At a time when Somalia is falling ever deeper into crisis, the website looks forward to positioning itself at the center of the ongoing policy debate and unbiased reporting from inside Somalia.

Somalia Report is an independent information source on Somalia. Founded in 2010, the over 100 correspondents and western editors offer a clear window into Somalia.

For interviews please contact: publisher@SomaliaReport.com

Ryerson talk

2011-10-19T09:23:00.000-07:00

For those of you in the GTA, I'll be giving a talk at Ryerson University on Wednesday, October 26 from 6:30-8:30pm. Admission is free and the event is open to all. For details and to register, please visit http://iid.kislenko.com/.

The beginning of the end?

2011-10-17T17:38:00.000-07:00

Last week, Robert Young Pelton of SomaliaReport.com penned an optimistic Op-Ed (reprinted below with permission of the author) declaring the End of History... at least as far as the Somali pirates are concerned. Pelton's argument, in essence, is that the pirates have priced themselves out of the market, their perpetually escalating ransom demands dooming a once-successful business model. Enhanced crew training, vessel hardening, and more prevalent use of armed security, Pelton claims, have left the pirates only the dregs of the high seas—"low sided bulk carriers"—as viable targets.

There is no doubt that burgeoning ransoms have amplified the appeal of violence of both sides; the pirates have matched the increased use of armed guards and more frequent assaults by the international naval forces with beatings, murder, and public hostage videos. The relatively peaceful, barter-and-release simplicity of the Golden Age of Somali piracy has been abrogated by harsh economic reality. The daring raid by Korean commandos on the hijacked Samho Jewelry earlier this year—the only assault on a commandeered tanker while the crew was still in the line of fire—likely never would have taken place if the vessel's cousin, the Samho Dream, had not fetched a then-record $9.5 million ransom a few months prior.

And the prey is certainly getting sparser. By some estimates, 10% of Suez Canal shipping traffic has been re-routed around the Cape of Good Hope, including many choice pirate targets (slow-moving tankers, in particular). An increasing number of vessels transiting pirate waters are arming themselves, and some have argued (unconvincingly, in my opinion) that the recent Kenyan kidnappings of Judith Tebbutt and Marie Dedieu have been a response to the growing difficulty in finding seaborne victims.

Though no vessel employing armed security has yet been hijacked, I am not quite as sanguine as Pelton about the impending end of piracy off Somalia. The pirates have demonstrated an uncanny penchant for adapting to the measures that shipping companies and the naval forces have thrown at them, and the hitherto quiet start to Pirate Season 2011-12 could simply be an ebb before the next torrent. The next evolution of pirate tactics could very well be to come out guns blazing, armed guards be damned.

The Beginning of the End for Piracy in Somalia
ROBERT YOUNG PELTON

Somalia Report has identified a trend that indicates that the $4.5M ransom may have been the tipping point for ship owners. Desperate to hit this magic number a number of recent ships have gone through heart breaking betrayal as negotiators reach an agreement only to discover they had been suckered. When discussions begin again the crestfallen owners are expected to dig deeper into that imaginary pot of money to meet the pirate investors' demands. The bottom line is that the main pirate groups are hurting. Stalled inventory, maxed out ransoms and heavy investments that have not paid off are putting more pressure on getting higher ransoms for the existing ships.

But this may be the beginning of the end.

What the pirates might not have noticed is that ships with the capability to pay these jumbo-sized ransoms have migrated to Best Management Practice (BMP), security on board, hardening, training, emergency drills, establishing secure citadels, and closer coordination with naval forces in the area. The oft repeated mantra that an armed ship has never been taken still rings true and insurance companies demand security and BMP on ships traveling exception routes. Companies like Maersk turn Somali waters into a race course as they zoom by at almost 20 knots, leaving small skiffs bobbing in their wake. The pirate's pickings are now low sided bulk carriers who have avoided insurance requirements and hope to play the law of averages.

In addition drones and local informants have been used to identify clumsily labeled "Pirate Action Groups" as they set out from land and look for victims. Although some nations use the mandate of preventative or collaborative action it is generally accepted that once the act of piracy commences, violent action can be taken to warn off, disable or kill all members of a pirate group.

The most destructive link to the criminal act of piracy would be the removal of the ransom process. Without the actual cash transfer process going smoothly, piracy would lose its main driver. The ransom process is a criminal act in most countries. Some countries like the UK condone the payment of funds to criminals due to concern for the hostages well being. The skewed logic is that the pirates fully intend to give life and property back therefore the payment itself just expedites the victim's safety and well being. Other countries (including Somalia) will arrest and convict anyone caught paying money to criminals essentially making the clear statement that ransom payers are collaborating and supporting the crime.

The filmsy moral rationale for piracy has long vanished. Only about 6% of vessels attacked are fishing in Somali waters and most are used for motherships. The "Robin Hood" effect of piracy has also vanished with local communities up in arms from Eyl to Hobyo. They are tired of the violence, drugs, alcohol and hangers on destroying their lifestyle.

The returns of piracy have diminished. Dozens of missing Somalis who went to sea in small skiffs looking for fortunes never to return are testament to the fool's gold of piracy. Piracy attacks are delivering less and less success forcing them to demand more from their current stolen inventory. There has been a significant drop in ships and hostages held with longer and longer negotiation times. This burns pirate investor money.

The facts are that piracy supports a handful of financiers, a few sea teams and that is about it. The good old days of a quick 90 day turn from grab to gone are over. Somalia's coastal communities are not awash with wealth. Pirates squander their cash windfalls while investors have put money back into more and more expensive failed missions.

Somali fishermen do not ply their trade with gusto and the entire coastal region of Somalia is a 'no go' zone putting pressure on all seafaring Somali's to survive.

Dealing with the problem of piracy has been a simple line item for ship owners. Less than 1% of all traffic in the region can expect an attack, let alone a ransom payoff.

Pirates are self interested criminals who steal, beat, abuse and sometimes kill innocent people to make money. Their names, phone numbers and locations are known to us, the local governments and we would assume the more sophisticated tracking elements of international governments. Yet nothing is done. Booyah is in prison operating by mobile phone. Garaad is a man about town in Puntland, small armed skiffs are tracked by drones and yet nothing substantial has been done to end this criminal anomaly.

The only thing standing between the status quo and total annihilation is the collective hand wringing of the governments who command the world's most impressive warships in the region. The maritime business is not set up to fight pirates, navies are. The men and women on the naval vessels are keen to fight pirates but hampered by rules of engagement, the locals on land are ready but frustrated by lack of money and support. Even burgeoning anti piracy efforts in Bosaso have been blocked by the UN, the very agency created to end piracy. It is time to deal a death blow to a tiny band of brigands who hold all of Somalia hostage. Somalia Report encourages insiders to speak out and have their stories, solutions and opinons published freely and without fear of censorship. Please send your thoughts and opinions to publisher@somaliareport.com

Article originally appeared here.

Latest article

2011-09-19T12:08:00.000-07:00

In response to the repeated questions I have received about the effects of the ongoing famine in Somalia on piracy in the region, I wrote an Op-Ed that was recently published in The Globe and Mail. In it, I discuss how poverty has never been a direct cause of Somali piracy:

Don't shed any tears for Somalia's pirates

A bloody end to a Kenyan vacation

2011-09-17T12:11:00.001-07:00

Earlier this week, British couple David and Judith Tebbutt were accosted by a gang of seaborne gunmen at Kiwayu Safari Village, an exclusive beachside resort in northern Kenya frequented by the likes of Mick Jagger (and considered as a possible destination for the royal honeymoon). After offering resistance to his attackers, Mr. Trebbutt was shot in the head, after which his wife was taken by speedboat to an undisclosed location within Somalia. The deluge of knee-jerk media reports following the kidnapping quickly laid the blame on Somali pirates, perhaps owing to pirate involvement in the kidnap and ransoming of Paul and Rachel Chandler, a British yachting couple seized in October 2009. History notwithstanding, there are three reasons why this latest crime is unlikely to be the work of pirates:

One: Pirates do not, as a rule, operate out of southern Somalia. While there are preliminary indications that the kidnappers originated in Kismaayo, the southernmost city to have been used as pirate base, the city is currently under Islamist control, making it a doubtful choice of HQ for any pirate organization wishing to avoid being shaken down.

Two: A cold-blooded killing would not be a pirate gang's natural response to an uncooperative hostage. While executions of hostages are not unprecedented, the casual brutality of David Tebbutt's murder simply does not jibe with the ethos of pirate operations.

Three: The kidnapping is otherwise entirely inconsistant with the typical pirate M.O. Pirates do not engage in commando-style raids, as land-based mission are both highly risky and relatively unprofitable. Why, when an average hijacking yields a captive crew of a dozen or more (not to mention an asset worth tens of millions of dollars), would a pirate gang chance an effective invasion of Kenya in order to capture a lone couple? As I discuss in my book, moreover, Somali piracy is not an intelligence-driven crime; pirates tend to set sail for international shipping lanes, cut their engines, and wait for their prey to come along. And if it ain't broke...

There have been recent suggestions pegging responsibility for the attack on the Ras Kambooni Brigades, a little-known southern Somali Islamist group with dizzying history of continually shifting allegiances and affiliations. The group's leader, Hassan al-Turki, is more familiar; a former ICU apparatchik, his name occupies a high place of honour on the US terror list. While it will likely take a few days for the truth of the matter to be firmly established, Ras Kambooni is a far more probable culprit than a rogue pirate gang operating on Islamist turf. What is less certain is Ms. Tebbutt's future well-being, as she remains, alone and grieving, at the mercy of a gang of barbaric killers; men, frankly, who are giving pirates a bad name.

Brisbane Writers Festival

2011-09-01T20:04:00.000-07:00

I'm heading down to the Brisbane Writers Festival tomorrow, an event I've been looking forward to with great anticipation since I first got the invite eight months ago. After a few nightmarish days bouncing between passport and visa offices, I'm finally ready to leave (almost). It'll be my first time in Australia, and I'm thrilled.

For those with a chance to check it out, I'll be appearing on three panel (details below). You can also keep pace with Festival happenings on Twitter, by following @BrisWritersFest.

Session 1: An Evening with International Writers

Date: Monday, 5 September
Time: 5:00-6:00pm
Venue: The Village Theatre, Sanctuary Cove, Gold Coast
Panellists: William Powers, Jay Bahadur, Catharine Ann
Chair: Joseph Braude
Description: For one night only, four international writers appear at Sanctuary Cove for an evening of intriguing conversation. Joseph Braude talks with William Powers, Jay Bahadur, and Cathrine Ann about adventure, survival, and philosophy in the digital age.

Session 2: Villains or Heroes
Date: Saturday, 10 September
Time: 5:30-6:30pm
Venue: Auditorium 1, State Library of Queensland

Panellists: Nigel Brennan, Jay Bahadur, Kay Danes

Chair: Robert MacDonald

Description: Former hostages Nigel Brennan and Kay Danes, along with Canadian journalist Jay Bahadur, discuss captivity. Who are the heroes and who are the villains? Is it possible to be both?

Presented by 612 ABC Brisbane

Session 3: Media-Led Revolution
Date: Saturday, 10 September
Time: 11:30am-12:30pm

Venue: The Edge, State Library of Queensland

Panellists: Annabel Crabb, Jay Bahadur, Joseph Braude,

Chair: Paul Barclay

Description: WikiLeaks, social media or citizen uprising: just who or what is responsible for the Arab Spring? Journalists Jay Bahadur, Joseph Braude and Annabel Crabb discuss with Paul Barclay new ways of reporting, how their roles have changed and the effects of the media revolution on political movements throughout the world.

Presented by Radio National

Please note this session will be recorded for later broadcast

Session 4: Deadly Waters: The Pirates of Somalia
Date: Sunday, 11 September
Time: 11:30am-12:30pm

Venue: Breezeway, Maiwar Green

Panellists: Jay Bahadur

Chair: Jonathan Fulcher

Description: Jay Bahadur ventured deep into Somalia to meet with groups of pirates as they conducted business, their cheeks bulging with khat and their cellphones ringing incessantly as they orchestrated the hijacking of huge ships owned by international conglomerates.

Wanted: Pirate Cultural Advisor

2011-08-21T07:45:00.000-07:00

On August 11th, the office of the European Union's anti-piracy force, NAVFOR, published what has to go down as one of the oddest want ads in history:

Career Vacancy: Pirate Cultural Advisor

Post Description:
To provide the Operation Commander (OpCdr) and OHQ staff with pirate cultural and religious advice and in particular to advise on pirate trends and weaknesses, including their perceived role in Somalia.

Professional Experience:
Military or ex-military who has worked with the CP [counter-piracy] Forces and/or other parties involved in CP (industry/insurers/negotiators).
Education: NA
Security Clearance: EU Secret

"The job title may sound ambiguous," Commander Harry Harrison, a spokesman for EUNAVFOR, subsequently admitted in an interview with the Sunday Telegraph. Ambiguous, certainly, but also bordering on nonsensical. According to the above job description, a knowledge of the pirates' "cultural and religious" proclivities would be an asset to the potential applicant. If there is a religion that sets pirates apart from the rest of the Somali population, it is unknown to me (though they do, admittedly, hold an unorthodox interpretation of the Koran's injunctions against theft).

"Cmdr. Harrison," the Telegraph reported, "said NAVFOR might also be interested in Somali applicants with detailed knowledge of the country and its clans." How many Somalis, particularly those moving in pirate circles, have military backgrounds (I'm guessing that the EU does not credit time served in clan militias), let alone experience working with the counter-piracy forces? It would not surprise me if not one qualified candidate exists; those who submit CVs are likely to be either foreign blowhards or local con artists.

On one hand, this could be a good indication, a sign that the European Union has become aware that something more than raw military force is needed in solving the problem of Somali piracy. More likely, a diktat has come down from high-ranking apparatchiks to make the piracy mission more "locally owned," "consultative," or whichever other buzz-word-of-the-moment is making the rounds at the top levels of EU leadership. One quick, incoherent press release later, and it's back to blowing pirates out of the water.

The Daily Show and more

2011-08-11T23:40:00.000-07:00

My August 9th appearance on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart (for US viewers, the full segment is also available here):

...PBS NewsHours with Ray Suarez:

...my July 29th spot on Bloomberg's Inside Track, with Deidre Bolton:

...and a few more:

C-SPAN Book TV interview with Cliff May, President of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies
Canada AM with Seamus O'Regan

Of Coast Guards and Pirates

2011-08-09T07:53:00.000-07:00

Some months back, Mark Mazzetti of The New York Times reported that the United Arab Emirates had contracted Reflex Responses—a private security firm with ties to Blackwater Worldwide founder Erik Prince— to build a mercenary army composed of primarily Columbian and South African recruits at a military base in the middle of the desert. The ostensible purpose of this Praetorian Guard is to keep an eye on Iran, although a skeptic might wonder if the recent wave of Arab unrest has helped convince the Emirati authorities of the need to keep the other eye on their own citizens.

Reflex Responses is only the latest example of the growing trend of states farming out the functions of their militaries to the private sector. Much has been written in recent years about the moral and practical hazards of employing private security contractors in war zones, where oversight is limited and the firms frequently operate in an environment of virtual impunity. In Somalia, which barely possesses a government capable of delegating away its own functions, the unforeseen complications can be even more far-reaching.

Such was the case in Puntland, the autonomous region in northeastern Somalia that spawned the 2008 outbreak of maritime piracy, and where I spent three months researching a book on the subject. In 1999, almost a decade before the Somali pirates began to crowd the pages of the international news, then-Puntland president Abdullahi Yusuf brought in the British military contractor Hart Security to provide a Coast Guard for the nascent statelet. For the task of preventing illegal fishing along Puntland’s 1,000-mile coastline, the firm was given one sixty-foot trawler and a force of seventy local men. Hart’s profit was to come from hypothetical future revenues from the sale of fishing licenses to foreign companies, which it split almost evenly with the Puntland government.

In the face of a brief civil conflict from 2001-2002, Hart withdrew from Somalia and was replaced by the Somali-Canadian Coast Guard (SomCan), a hastily-cobbled-together outfit run by Abdiweli Ali Taar, a former Toronto cab driver. At its height, SomCan operated a fleet of six patrol ships and four hundred marines, and the company claimed to have identified and arrested a total of thirty illegal foreign fishing vessels. During its tenure, SomCan carried Hart’s fishing license business model to a new level, serving as the direct agent for several south Asian fishing companies, and even going so far as to post its own marines on the decks of its clients’ ships. Its relationship with one Thai company, Sirichai Fisheries, was literally skin tight, with Sirichai reportedly providing the uniforms for the SomCan marines. SomCan continued operations until 2005, when the firm was fired by Puntland president Mohamud Muse Hersi after its own employees hijacked a Thai fishing vessel and demanded an $800,000 ransom.

Following their dismissal, there is substantial evidence—including from my own interviews with pirates—that former Hart and SomCan marines turned to piracy. During one of my trips to Puntland, I interviewed a pirate named Ombaali, a sullen and physically stunted youth in his early twenties, who had to be virtually dragged through the door and forced to speak to me. Ombaali, who had served as a “holder,” or hostage guard, during three pirate operations in 2008, reported that eight members of his extended gang (roughly fifty individuals) had had past histories in the Puntland Coast Guard. “They were the most experienced at attacking and capturing,” he said.

It would be overly simplistic to attribute the better organized and sophisticated breed of pirate that burst into the Gulf of Aden in 2007 and 2008 solely to Puntland’s failed coast guarding experiments; the timing of the piracy outbreak had much more to do with the fiscal and military collapse of the Puntland government in 2007 than a sudden decision by former coast guards to collectively turn to a life of crime. But there is no denying that the skills and experience possessed by ex-Hart and SomCan marines—trained, in many cases, to a European standard in marksmanship, marine navigation, boarding and seizure operations—rendered them ideal employees for the new businesses springing up in Puntland’s coastal towns.

The Puntland government, moreover, is yet to learn from its past mistakes. In November 2010, Puntland entered into a deal with Saracen International, a South African private security firm with no clear address, to “train and mentor” a thousand-strong “Puntland Marine Force.” The firm—whose Ugandan subsidiary has been fingered by the UN Security Council for training rebel paramilitary forces in the Congo—is headed by Lafras Lutingh, a former officer in the South African Civil Cooperation Bureau, a notorious apartheid-era internal security force. Several months after the announcement of the Puntland deal, Saracen was revealed to be covertly backed by Erik Prince, and funded by the United Arab Emirates. Pressure by the Associated Press and The New York Times subsequently led to the Puntland government shelving the project, at least for the time being.

Guns-for-hire are always a tempting option for governments, particularly in a failed state where national institution building can often seem like a hopeless task. But unlike an army or a police force, private contractors can disappear as quickly as a contract expires, leaving unpredictable long-term fallout. The case of the Puntland Coast Guard should serve as a cautionary tale from the anthology of unintended consequences, an illustration of what can come from selling off pieces of a state before the state exists at all. Yesterday’s coast guards, after all, can become today’s pirates.

[The preceding was an unpublished Op-Ed I wrote about a month ago—somewhat out of date, but hopefully still of interest. Much of the content was taken from a chapter in my book, "Of Pirates, Coast Guards, and Fishermen."]

The Daily Show and The New York Times

2011-08-05T18:41:00.000-07:00

First, I received some great news yesterday: I'm going to be on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart this coming Tuesday. I'm driving down to New York tomorrow with a few friends, to enjoy the city for a few days before the show. Needless to say (but I'll say it anyway), I'm looking forward to it.

In other news, the following is an excerpt from Joshua Hammer's review of The Pirates of Somalia, which will appear in this week's edition of The New York Times' Sunday Book Review:

Bahadur captures the inner workings of Somali piracy in extraordinary detail. The organizational structure of typical pirate cells, he explains, includes not just attackers, interpreters, accountants and cooks: almost every group also has its supplier of khat, a plant flown into Somalia by the ton every day from Kenya and Ethiopia and chewed for an addictive high. Like low-level urban crack dealers, the pirates at the bottom rung of the hierarchy make barely enough to survive. But, high or low, these brigands practice some peculiar rituals. After receiving his cut of the ransom on the captured ship, one pirate tells Bahadur, each man must toss his mobile phone into the ocean — a precaution to make sure no one can call ahead to his kin to arrange an ambush of his fellow cell members.

The full review is available here.

It's been a great couple days.

Book launch bonanza

2011-07-27T15:41:00.000-07:00

It's been a hectic past week, as my book, The Pirates of Somalia: Inside Their Hidden World, launched in the US and Canada. The onsale date itself (July 19) tested the limits of my mental endurance, as I did seventeen interviews over the course of the day, twelve of which were essentially identical (local CBC radio hosts reading off a shared syndication script). Still, I can't complain.

I arrived back in Toronto yesterday after a five-day mini press tour through New York City and Washington D.C. The media reception has been fantastic: I was invited to do two brief TV spots on Fox News, a ten-minute segment for Bloomberg's Inside Track (available here), an interview on PBS Newshour (available here), and an hour-long segment for C-SPAN's Book TV.

There has also been considerable print coverage, highlights as follow:

Low conduct on the high seas, a review in The Globe & Mail by original Toronto pirate author Daniel Sekulich.
Can I get a little piracy?, a feature by National Post reporter Jessica Hume.
Author Talk, a Q&A with CBS' Jeff Glor.
Do Somali pirates have legit gripe? by Cliff May, president of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies

Boston Globe and AP reviews

2011-07-17T21:48:00.000-07:00

Latest review of the book, from The Boston Globe:

Debunking myths of pirates by David M. Shribman.

Katharine Houreld's (Associated Press) review is also out today: Secrets of Somali pirates revealed in new book, written by Canadian who lived among them

John Batchelor Show

2011-07-10T21:52:00.000-07:00

I was interviewed last night by guest host Simon Constable on the WABC's The John Batchelor Show. The audio is available here; my interview begins at 18:21.

Latest shameless self-promotion

2011-07-07T09:52:00.000-07:00

Another (very short) review of my book appeared on Tuesday in The Observer's e-mail collection Very Short List, which called it "a brisk, revealing real-life adventure story." Full review here.

In other news, I made an appearance yesterday (well, technically today, by local time) on the Australian current affairs program The Wire: link to that interview is available here.

My June 27 interview with Fran Kelly of ABC Radio National Breakfast is also available online.

...as is my June 28 interview on Radio New Zealand's Nine to Noon.

Ledger of death

2011-06-27T09:45:00.000-07:00

Last week, Reuters cited a claim by the advocacy group Save Our Seafarers that 62 mariners have been killed, either directly or indirectly, by Somali pirates since 2007. In truth, I was skeptical of this number; though grisly incidents like the February 2011 executions of four American yachters aboard the S/V Quest are bound to stick in one's mind, the steady litany of deaths resulting from mistreatment, disease, and malnutrition tend not to make it into the headlines. So, my thanks to Compass Risk Management for diligently verifying the figure:

Vessel Name	Date of Hijack	Duration (Days)	Number Dead^†
Ching Fong Hwa 168	28/4/08	191	1
Victoria	19/5/07	n/a	1
Bunga Melati Dua	19/8/08	41	1
Faina	25/9/08	133	1
Action	10/10/08	63	1
Ekawat Nava 5	18/11/08	n/a	15
Sea Princess II	3/1/09	113	1
Tanit	4/4/09	6	1
Win Far 161	6/4/09	311	3
GNA	26/4/09	n/a	1
Marathon	7/5/09	47	1
Theresa VII	16/11/09	120	1
Iceberg 1	28/3/10	439 (ongoing)	1
Jih-chun Tsai no 68	30/3/10	417	1
Rak Africana	11/4/10	333	1
Prantaly 11	18/4/10	293	1
Prantaly 14	18/4/10	285	6
QSM Dubai	2/6/10	1	1
Polar	30/10/10	224 (ongoing)	2
Sirichainava II	2/11/10	3	5
Vega 5	30/12/10	72	9
Beluga Nominaiton	22/1/11	82	3
Quest	18/2/11	5	4
		Total:	62

One entry on this ledger of death drew my attention: the Dutch-owned cargo ship MV Marathon, which was hijacked on May 7, 2009 while transporting coke fuel through the Gulf of Aden "safety" corridor. During my second trip to Somalia, in June 2009, I encountered the gang responsible for hijacking of the Marathon in the coastal village of Dhanane, in whose harbour, a few stone's throws from the precipitous bluff overlooking a white sand beach, the Marathon was anchored.

In a poorly-lit leanto in the centre of the village, I met a man dressed in rumpled brown khakis named Dar Muse Gaben, who I soon learned was the gang's logistics officer, responsible for keeping the gang supplied with food and, more importantly, khat. It became apparent that Gaben took his job very seriously, for he soon left to fetch a round of warm 7-Ups and cups of sweet tea for me and my translator. Gaben jokingly quipped about how he kept the Marathon's Ukrainian hostages so well fed that they had become overweight. "Let me tell you," he said, "they like it better on that ship than in the Ukraine." I only discovered later that the ship's welder, Serhiy Vartenkov, had been accidentally shot and killed during the boarding operation; the cook, Georgi Gussakov, had also taken a stray bullet and was in critical condition by the time the Marathon was ransomed. The pirates had concealed the casualties during the negotiation process in order to maximize their payoff.

If there's anything positive in the above figures, it is that the pirates rarely murder hostages deliberately; of the 62 total deaths, just seven have been executions (in fact, by far the biggest single loss of life was caused by the notoriously sanguinary Indian navy, which in late 2008 mistakenly blew the Thai fishing vessel Ekawat Nava 5 out of the water). Yet there is little doubt that the pirates are getting more violent, a trend supported by the fact that half the above fatalities have occurred over the last year. Furthermore, lengthening captivity periods mean that malnutrition, illness, and psychological stress (to date, two hostages have committed suicide) are likely to contribute to an even greater body count going forward.

^†A more detailed description of each case is available in the following report.

Journalist Nation is seeking submissions

2011-06-21T13:40:00.000-07:00

My online news startup, Journalist Nation, is getting close to its launch date, and I encourage you to check out the site.

Journalist Nation will feature videos paired with personalized written narratives, contributed by our members—news through your eyes and words. Our correspondents will be ordinary people on the street—anyone in possession of a cell phone camera, a video recorder, or even a point-and-click. The hope is for Journalist Nation to provide an outlet for those otherwise unable to bring global attention to the issues that matter to them.

We're currently seeking story submissions for the site launch; details on how to contribute can be found on the Upload page. You can also suport us by joining our Facebook group and following us on Twitter (@JournoNation). And please don't forget to re-post and re-tweet—the more the better!

The mothers of all motherships

2011-06-08T14:08:00.000-07:00

Last week, an interesting piece from Reuters relayed the IMO's warning that pirates are currently able to attack year round, attributing this augmented capacity to their increasing use of motherships. The report itself was nothing revelatory; mothership use has been steadily rising since 2009, and so far the motley dhows that have made up the pirate fleet have not proven themselves capable of sustaining operations in the face of the fierce winds of the Indian Ocean monsoons. What's worthy of note is the relatively recent deployment of hijacked tankers as "super-motherships," or, as the acronym-enamoured US military has styled them, "LPSVs" (Large Pirate Support Vessels). The practice is not much more than six months old, beginning with the October 2010 commandeering of the roll-on/lift-off cargo vessel MV Izumi. Since then, several other large commercial ships have been converted into motherships, including the German LPG tanker MV York and the 73,000-tonne tanker MT Polar, which in late November was sighted conducting pirate operations roughly 400 km off Somalia's eastern coast. Needless to say, vessels weighing in the tens of thousands of tons are perfectly capable of navigating choppy seas, and it will be interesting to see if the next couple months bring a drop off in pirate attacks comparable to what we have seen in years past. My guess is that they will; with only a handful of LPSVs in operation, one has to figure that the majority of pirates will remain grounded during the monsoons. But this is a trend to watch.

For a more in-depth discussion of the subject, I refer you to the following excellent blog post on the Idarat Maritime website.

BBC Radio Scotland and Sunday Times review

2011-06-06T09:20:00.000-07:00

Last week I was interviewed by BBC Radio Scotland's Shereen, which aired this past Sunday at 9:00a GMT. The full programme is available here.

On the print side, another review of Deadly Waters is out, this one from The Sunday Times:

[A] vivid and intelligent study of Somali pirates . . . Bahadur has produced a balanced and fascinating portrait of the lives and exploits of these pirates, and of Somalia’s only reliably lucrative industry.

Click here for the full article (the Times is behind a pay wall, so for now this is the best available).

Guardian excerpt

2011-05-26T22:36:00.000-07:00

The Guardian ran an excerpt of Deadly Waters in its G2 supplement yesterday:

It had taken five days to arrange this meeting. Somali pirates are hard to track down, constantly moving around and changing phone numbers. Days earlier, frustrated and eager to begin interviewing, I had naively suggested approaching some suspected pirates on the streets of Garowe, a rapidly expanding city at the heart of the pirates' tribal homeland. Habitually munching on narcotic leaves of khat, they are easy enough to spot, their gleaming Toyota four-wheel-drives slicing paths around beaten-up wheelbarrows and pushcarts. My Somali hosts laughed, explaining that to do so would invite kidnapping, robbery, or, at the very least, unwanted surveillance. In Somalia, everything is done through connections – clan, family or friend – and these networks are expansive and interminable. Warsame, my guide and interpreter, had been on and off the phone for the better part of a week, attempting to coax his personal network into producing Abdullahi "Boyah" Abshir. Eventually it responded, and Boyah presented himself.

Full article available here: "Somali pirate: 'We're not murderers, we just attack ships'"

Booklist review

2011-05-26T09:31:00.000-07:00

The Pirates of Somalia: Inside Their Hidden World.
Bahadur, Jay (Author)
Jul 2011. 320 p. Pantheon, hardcover, $26.95.

Bored with his job in marketing research, Bahadur decided to travel to Somalia in 2008–09 to investigate maritime brigandage. His boldness results in an insightful report based on interviewing pirates in their lairs, educing their rationales for hijacking ships, figuring out the finances of piracy, and embedding the whole phenomenon in the clan-based society from which it emanates. He alighted in the Puntland region, whose bleak landscapes and crumbling buildings he economically describes as he recounts jouncing trips on pot-holed roads through trackless desert. Conducted during hours-long sessions of chewing the stimulant drug khat, Bahadur’s conversations captured pirates’ life stories and their apologia for buccaneering. They cynically claimed to be protecting Somali territorial waters. For their hostages’ views, Bahadur went to a pirate cove, in which a captured ship lay at anchor. Not permitted to speak with the captive crew, he gathered its members’ accounts after they were ransomed and released. Bahadur’s revelatory journalism and astute analysis of causes and solutions prove far more informative than any TV footage about the contemporary piracy problem.

— Gilbert Taylor

Fear-mongering never gets old

2011-05-16T07:57:00.000-07:00

After two and a half years spent researching Somali piracy, I thought I had become inured to the sensationalist guff that the topic inevitably seems to inspire. Then a very special piece of hysterical twaddle, such US Senator Mark Kirk's (R-IL) recent report on piracy, comes along to rouse my dulled sense of outrage. In his fifteen-page brief, Kirk paints a grossly distorted portrait of the threat posed by Somali piracy, which he seems to view as the latest in a series of historical crises aimed at upsetting American hegemony. Indeed, his report is peppered with apparent references to US history; Kirk's colour-coded "Somali Political Control Map" labels political factions as "Unionist" and "secessionist," he warns of the danger to "American and allied shipping" that conjures up images of German U-boats, and he counsels a return to the "tradition of the Jefferson Administration" and its Barbary war. Even in his description of the handful of rescue operations carried out by US and "Allied" navies, which he refers to (without any hint of facetiousness) as "notable battles against pirates," Kirk demonstrates a markedly exaggerated perception of the scale of the problem.

There are over four thousand words in this report (and a whole slew of numbers) but Kirk's entire agenda is laid bare in his first paragraph, highlighted in bold: "Unless our policy becomes more aggressive to attack pirates," Kirk writes, "we will see a huge increase in terrorism from Al Qaeda affiliates that feed off pirate ransoms." The rest of the report adds nothing in support of this thesis, but rather supplies ledgers of unsourced stats and unrelated assertions whose only seeming purpose is to convince his readers that they are looking at a legitimate piece of research. After sifting through the chaff, it eventually becomes clear that the weight of Kirk's entire argument rests on a single unsubstantiated claim by the Kenyan government that 30% of ransom money (more than $50 million, apparently) is "funneled to the East African Al Qaeda/Al Shabaab Islamic terrorist groups." This is the same government, mind you, that announced that the pirates had pulled in $150 million in 2008, a figure roughly fivefold larger than the reality.

Senator Kirk maps out his strategy, Bossaso.

As I argue in my book, links between pirates and terrorists undoubtedly exist, but they tend to be isolated and non-systematic—opportunistic individuals with Islamist ties who happen to dabble in piracy investments on the side. A prime example is thuggish southern warlord Yusuf Mohammed Siad "Inda'adde," a pirate financier who alternatively calls himself a TFG minister, a Shabaab potentate, and an Independent, depending on the expediency of the moment. Somali political relationships, unfortunately, are not so clearly defined as Senator Kirk's neatly chequered map would have us believe.

Shabaab militias began pushing north into Mudug in the spring of last year, driving many pirates in Harardheere north to Hobyo (since then, disgruntled Hobyo locals have forced the pirates even further north). In the aftermath, there has been some convincing evidence that the pirates still operating in the Harardheere region have reached informal "profit-sharing" arrangements with Shabaab leaders. Yet to say that Kirk is sensationalizing Islamist-pirate links would be an understatement. I do not know, nor care to speculate on, what sort of political manoeuvrings Kirk is involved in, for which lobbyists' marching band he is beating his anti-terror drum, or whether he has simply trained himself to see the rest of the world as a breeding ground-in-waiting for anti-American extremism. His motivations are not that important. Fear-mongering hucksters like Senator Kirk will always exist, seizing upon any scrap of evidence and attempting to peddle it as whole-cloth. We can only hope that once Kirk's moment in the media spotlight has passed, wiser heads within the Obama administration will fling his half-baked opus into the dustbin, where it belongs.

Publishers Weekly review

2011-05-10T13:45:00.000-07:00

An advance review of my forthcoming book is just out from Publishers Weekly:

The Pirates of Somalia: Inside Their Hidden World

Jay Bahadur. Pantheon, $26.95 (320p) ISBN 978-0-307-37906-1

The inner workings of the world of Somali pirates are astutely explored by Bahadur, a journalist who embedded himself among them to detail how "a level of international naval cooperation unprecedented in human history has been unable to stop a motley assortment of half-starved brigands armed with aging assault rifles and the odd grenade launcher." It's an engaging account, full of solid analysis about the collapse of Somalia and the tight-knit clan and subclan networks that keep a failed state from dissolving into complete anarchy while fostering conditions ideally suited to ocean-going criminality. Few other economic options exist for young men along this harsh coastline, largely because of abusive fishing practices by foreign trawler fleets. The institutionalization of these hijackings has created an economic order among the pirates not unlike other forms of organized crime. Coupled with the widespread addiction to the narcotic herb khat, conditions for wiping out piracy may be impossible to achieve. Still Bahadur's interviews with the pirates reveal that they rarely relish criminality; it's genuine desperation that motivates them. What's especially impressive (aside from Bahadur's sheer nerve in insinuating himself among these dangerous men in a lawless corner of the world) is the amassing of multiple perspectives--of pirates and policymakers--that support a rich, suspenseful account. (July)

Enough about lasers

2011-04-22T12:06:00.000-07:00

Lasers are in the news again, as the US Navy has successfully tested a solid-state high energy laser fired from a warship. Overcoming violently bobbing seas, the laser managed to set its target's engine on fire from miles distant, a fact attested by a subsequent YouTube video:

Shortly following the test, commentators jumped to suggest an immediate application of the weapon: hunting pirates (see, for instance, US Navy's laser test could put heat on pirates). It is the second time in recent months that lasers have been proposed as anti-pirate weapons, the first being BAE's development of a laser distraction system in January.

Believe me, I get it: shooting pirates with lasers would be really cool (a view shared by the BBC News anchor who asked his guest, an expert on maritime security, if the pirates would be able to defend themselves from such a weapon by holding up a giant mirror). But the challenge faced by the international naval forces off Somalia is being within miles of the pirates when they attack, not what weapons to use once they have them in their sights. Put simply, you don't need space age weaponry to defeat poorly-trained brigands armed with a motley collection of aging assault rifles and the odd RPG launcher. I'll admit, it's an amusing image: that of a wretched, half-starved Somali pirate, a US warship bearing down on him, secretly relieved that his ordeal has come to an end and resignedly preparing to toss his gun overboard and surrender himself, only to look on in perplexed bewilderment as the outboard motor on his beat up fishing skiff suddenly erupts into spontaneous flame.

This is a one-sided arms race if there's ever been one.

The numbers lie

2011-04-08T14:02:00.000-07:00

Charles Lane, the former editor of The New Republic who helped expose the Stephen Glass scandal, once told an interviewer that the "mystique acquired by words printed on paper" was what had permitted Glass's journalistic fabrications, though in hindsight utterly outlandish, to pass unquestioned for years. Glass was hubrisitic enough to invent fictitious people, buildings, even government agencies-- such flagrant falsehoods, in other words, that his downfall was preordained. Statistics are far more insidious offenders; they hide their lies in numbers, mask their troubled histories behind ciphers on a page.

An indelible professor of mine at McGill University, who taught a class titled The Underground Economy, once described being at a cocktail-and-canapé attended by sundry UN bigwigs in New York. Spotting the then-head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), my professor approached and began a conversation. The UNODC had recently upped its estimate of the annual worth of the global illicit drug trade by some $50 billion, and my professor wished to know the basis for this lofty revision. Flustered and defensive, the UN chief stormed out of the room. He later returned in a calmer state, admitting to my prof that word had come down from the Secretary General's office to make the drug trade a greater priority over the coming year; cooking the stats seemed a good first step. This anecdote has stuck in my mind ever since, and remains one of the single most important lessons from my university years.

My eternal mistrust of statistics has proved especially appropriate over the course of my current assignment. Shortly after the Somali pirates hit the international news pages in late 2008, for instance, Kenyan foreign affairs minister Moses Wetangula claimed that the pirates had been paid $150 million over the previous year, a baseless figure that he (correctly) deemed was sufficiently large to earn him some ink in the international press (the actual number was around $30 million). A more recent dubious figure making the press rounds is $238 million, the amount allegedly earned by the pirates in 2010, according to a report by the think tank One Earth Future (OEF). Yet diligent scrutiny reveals this figure to be barely more credible than Wetangula's concoction. The estimate, I determined, had been calculated by multiplying a rough estimate of the average pirate ransom ($5.4 million)—a number derived midway through the year from a sample size of less than ten—by the total number of ships hijacked in 2010 (44). While sloppy in its overall methodology, the report also contained a more rudimentary flaw in logic: the assumption that every ship hijacked in 2010 was ransomed during the same year. In reality, the vast majority were not released until 2011; indeed, as of this writing many are still anchored within sight of the Somali shore.

Immediately suspicious of this report, I decided to attempt my own estimate. I set about researching each vessel hijacked since 2008 and the amount paid to release it, supplying my own guesswork where ransoms had not been publicly disclosed. The result? The cash paid to pirates in 2010 fell in the range of $65-$85 million, or about one third the OEF estimate. My (admittedly rough) initial calculations are available here.

Junk statistics are everywhere, but they tend to seek out certain victims, like Somali piracy, where facts are scarce and credible authorities few. It is environments like these in which junk stats thrive, breeding and propagating themselves like so many germs on a handkerchief. The media is only too willing to serve as a transmission vector, eagerly quoting whichever individual or organization conjures up the largest (and most sensational) figures; even The Economist, generally assiduous with its stats, quotes this mammoth estimate in its latest piece on piracy. In the age of Internet journalism, as stories are churned out increasingly rapidly and with commensurately less oversight, the danger posed by junk stats has become more immediate.

The printed word is too often treated as sacrosanct, imbued with an authority that overrules our own judgment. We must always remember that people, with their own flaws, biases, and agendas, write the words. And the numbers.

The brutality escalates

2011-03-27T19:41:00.000-07:00

Hopes of rescue have become faint for the family of Danish yachters captured by Somali pirates on February 24—three children among them—as reports confirmed that they had been transferred to a secret location near Bargaal after Puntland forces unsuccessfully attempted to free them. We can now only hope that they escape the fate of Americans Sean and Jean Adam, along with crewmates Phyllis Macay and Bob Riggle, who were murdered by pirates after their yacht, S/V Quest, had been hijacked 250 miles off the coast of Oman.

Executing hostages is never an economically sound decision on the part of the pirates. Provoked into panic by the rapid approach of US commandos, the decision to kill the four Americans was evidently made by two hijackers acting alone, who were then summarily shot by their own commander. Somali pirates are often more of a danger to each other than to hostages; the gangs are usually split along family and even clan lines, and the pressure of US warships bearing down on them can easily cause existing divisions to ignite into violent confrontations. Nonetheless, the Quest incident was an act of unprecedented brutality—one, I believe, that would never have been committed by the pirates operating just a few years ago.

In 2009, I spent three months in Somalia, fraternizing with pirates while conducting research for my forthcoming book. I shared their drugs (a leafy narcotic called “khat,” similar to the coca leaf), joined them in their homes, and visited their coastal bases of operation. I became closely embedded with a gang of former fishermen-turned-pirates, led by the locally infamous Abshir Abdullahi, a Godfather-like figure known by the sobriquet of “Boyah.” Boyah and his men were thieves, but not killers, expressing a surprisingly-evolved brooding introspection about the morality of their actions. By the time of my second visit, in June, Boyah had launched a “redemption movement,” inspired by a personal religious awakening, and planned to convert his entire pirate organization into a regional coast guard (his plans never really got off the ground).
“We would never have killed anyone,” Boyah once told me. “It was always just a bluff.”

Things, it seems, have changed since Boyah's day. The ranks are now filled by a new breed of pirate, petty inland gangsters with backgrounds in gunslinging rather than fishing. Last month, the Associated Press reported that Somali pirates had begun to “systematically torture” their hostages: beating them, locking them in freezers, and ligating their genitals with plastic ties. Though disturbing in its detail, the AP article described a trend that had been mounting for some time.

In 2009, former pirate hostages to whom I spoke reported being treated with courtesy by their captors, if not kindness (the pirates' courtesy, however, did not extend to allowing the crew to retain any of their personal belongings). Only one member of the pirate gang had a sadistic streak, threatening, over roast goat and rice one evening, to execute the entire crew if the ransom was not delivered. Such behaviour has now become the norm.

Ever-fattening ransoms are largely to blame for attracting the more recent, bloodthirsty brand of pirate to the business. Boyah's greatest prize, the Japanese chemical tanker MV Golden Nori, fetched a paltry $1.5 million in 2008; by contrast, the Korean oil tanker MV Samho Dream was ransomed for an estimated $9.5 million in late 2010. Pirate negotiators, known locally as dilals, are becoming more experienced and professional. With hijacked vessels and their cargos worth hundreds of millions of dollars (to say nothing of the crew's lives), the dilals are only beginning to realize that shipping companies are willing to cough up much more than 1-2% of a vessel's worth in order to have it released. Each record-setting ransom sets a precedent that drives up future payments, a fact that explains why many shipowners make it a policy not to publicly disclose ransom amounts. But in Somalia, whose inhabitants are interconnected by vast kin and clan networks, the word inevitably spreads.

As ransoms continue to rise at an unchecked pace, the violence is only going to escalate further. There is no end to the Somali pirate scourge in sight.

US cover!

2011-03-24T08:38:00.000-07:00

From Pantheon Books:

Bargaal's "Anti-Piracy Committee"

2011-03-23T13:46:00.000-07:00

While perusing the (excellent) recently-launched independent news website SomaliaReport, I stumbled upon a gem. Two years after organizing a vigilante raid that saw twelve armed pirates captured, it seems that elders in the northeastern town of Bargaal have come together to form an "Anti-Piracy Committee," which aims to prevent pirates from using Bargaal as a base of operations. This nascent institution lost no time in letting the media know what it was about, publicly issuing a seven-point charter:

Article 1- The pirates can not carry out operations from the town and with their captured ships be removed;
Article 2- The pirates must return two stolen cars;
Article 3- The pirates are forbidden from playing loud music and partying after ransoms are received;
Article 4- No weapons or discharge of weapons allowed in the town;
Article 5- No unauthorized meetings without coordination;
Article 6- No alcohol, wine or drugs allowed in town;
Article 7- Any individual who disobeys these lasy (sic) will be punished.

May I humbly suggest an eighth article?:
Article 8- All pirates are equal, but some pirates are more equal than others.

Interviewed on BNN

2011-03-12T13:11:00.000-08:00

My Business News Network (BNN) interview is up on the SqueezePlay website.

Live on CNN

2011-03-04T09:03:00.000-08:00

My appearance today on CNN's American Morning:

Spectre of the War on Terror

2011-02-25T10:21:00.000-08:00

Earlier this week there occurred a tragedy unprecedented in the brief history of Somali piracy. In circumstances not yet entirely clear, Americans Sean and Jean Adam, along with crewmates Phyllis Macay and Bob Riggle, were murdered by pirates after their yacht, the S/V Quest, had been hijacked 250 miles off the coast of Oman. Shadowed by four US warships, navy helicopters whirring overhead, the pirates reportedly panicked and began to fight amongst themselves over which course of action to take. Responding to the sounds of gunfire aboard the Quest, US forces were speedily dispatched to the yacht, prompting the pirates to execute the hostages.

The hijacking brought an end to the Adams' trip around the world--their yacht ballasted with thousands of bibles to hand out along the way--on a voyage touted by the media as "a mission of faith and adventure." I do not wish to discuss the facts of the case, to which I can add little, but rather its treatment in the mainstream media. The following report, presented by CNN newsroom anchor Kyra Phillips and Pentagon correspondent Chris Lawrence, aired on February 22:

I draw your attention to a few highlights:

1:36
LAWRENCE: "...this wasn't a matter of trying to push their Christian faith in the Muslim lands... they actually had gone to the Pacific area, specifically Thailand, to sort of share their Christian faith with other Christians."

2:29
PHILLIPS: "...they were actually passing out Bibles and ministering to people along this trip, right?..."
LAWRENCE: "Exactly. Exactly, Kyra."

3:16
LAWRENCE: "...I don't want people to draw religious implications from what happened. There's no evidence of that. In fact, most of the pirates that come from the northern part of Somalia are not radical Islamists..." [Ed: no pirates are "radical Islamists"]

What "religious implications" did Lawrence fear his viewers would draw? Might they have concluded that the murders of the four Christian yachters had been a jihadist hit? That their murderers, catching wind of the Adams' proselytizing cruise through "Muslim lands" had set a deliberate course for the Quest, managing to intercept her 750 miles off the Somali coast? That, discovering their intel to be true, the pirates had reacted like typical Islamists and executed the infidels? This may be a caricature of Lawrence's perception of the situation, but not a very gross one.

Absurdity, it seems, is no longer too great an obstacle to reporters seeking to pass off any news story involving Muslims as a product of the so-called Clash of Civilizations. Were Phillips and Lawrence simply pandering to the prejudices of their audience? Or is the explanation more basic: that in order to make it as a network newscaster today, one must be hardwired to see the Islamist behind the scene, as our brains pick out packets of language from streams of continuous sound?

I am continually baffled by how the "Us vs. Them" trope pervades and distorts American journalism, but rarely does it bare its soul so utterly.

UK cover!

2011-01-23T18:33:00.000-08:00

Publication in the UK is scheduled for mid-June.

New laser system may be another blind alley

2011-01-17T15:09:00.000-08:00

There has been much talk in the news lately about BAE's development of a non-lethal laser system as a defence against pirate attacks (see, for example, the following).

The weapon, described by BAE as a "laser distraction system," has a maximum range of over two kilometres, and at lesser distances causes disorientation and temporary blindness.

Artist's representation of the BAE laser cannon.

The question is whether focused light will be any more effective than the focused sound canons (or LRADs--Long Range Acoustic Devices) that proved so laughably inadequate during the early days of Somali piracy. One advantage favouring the BAE laser system, besides its vastly superior range, is its ability to target multiple attacking vessels at once--a useful attribute, given that pirates generally attack in teams of two or more skiffs.

Unfortunately, BAE's laser cannon runs into the same problem as other active security measures: its prohibitive cost. Although BAE has described the device itself as "low cost," it is logical to assume that trained guards will still be required to operate it. Maritime shipping is one of the most competitive industries in the world, and shipowners can rarely afford to deploy security, even the roughly $10,000 per day to hire a team of unarmed guards. Nor, indeed, does the risk of a hijacking justify such an outlay; with only a fraction of one percent of commercial ships transiting the region falling victim to Somali pirate attacks, simply paying a ransom is usually a much more cost-effective strategy. Even if the laser system were provided for free, in other words, none but a select group of elite of shipping companies would be able to bear the cost of running it.

Many creative solutions have been proposed to bring an end to Somali piracy; the persistent challenge is finding a solution that conforms to the fiscal realities of the global shipping trade.

2010 in summary

2011-01-03T11:56:00.000-08:00

Buoyed by a flurry of hijackings over the final months of 2010, it is hard to argue that the Somali pirates did not enjoy a great year. 2010 saw a total of 74 documented hijackings, up from 68 in 2009, and there are a record 771 known hostages currently being held by the pirates.

The following table was compiled using data from ECOTERRA, a Nairobi-based NGO:

	Number of Attacks	Hijackings	Success Rate
2008	134	50	37%
2009	228	68	30%
2010	243	74	30%

Though the creation of the Gulf of Aden transit corridor in late 2008 produced a moderate drop in the success rate of pirate attacks, absolute numbers of hijackings continue to rise. Despite increasingly intensive international naval pressure in 2010, including a reformulated strategy by the EUNAVFOR task force, the pirates extended their attack range in every direction. The numbers say it all: the current, navally-focused approach to combatting piracy is simply not working.

And the trials go on

2010-12-23T00:07:00.000-08:00

In the early days of Somali piracy, a dozen pirates made the mistake of attacking and seizing the French luxury yacht Le Ponant. After the hijackers had received their ransom and departed the ship, French special forces tracked them inland to the village of Jariban, where they disabled their getaway vehicles and took six of the men into custody, flying them all the way to Paris to face justice.

The prohibitive cost of dragging Somali pirates through Western domestic legal systems has since tempered this initial zeal, and warships have been largely content to foist their growing throngs of pirate detainees onto the Puntland or Kenyan justice systems. This practice has now become increasingly untenable; as I discussed in a previous post, the Kenyan government has opted to showcase its talent at extortion rather than the alleged quality of its courts, continually threatening to end its piracy trials unless the international community comes up with more cash.

Perhaps spurred by Kenya's decreasing reliability as a partner, Western countries have begun to take justice into their own hands. In the first trial of its kind in almost two centuries, on 29 November a Virginia judge sentenced one pirate to 30 years for his involvement in a (clearly confused) assault on a US warship; five of his colleagues will face possible life imprisonment when they are sentenced in March. At around the same time, Germany announced that it was to try 10 pirates captured in an attack on the German cargo vessel MV Taipan, and the following month both Spain and Belgium revealed their intentions to follow suit. In December, the Netherlands became the first European country to prosecute pirates who had not been involved in an attack on its own nationals, agreeing to try five Somalis captured by the HMS Amsterdam following an attack on a South African yacht. Even tiny Seychelles, the only regional state other than Kenya to offer up its courts to piracy trials, recently jailed for 22 years nine pirates picked up by one of its Coastguard vessels in late 2009.

At present, these à la carte prosecutions seem more piecemeal reactions to specific incidents, rather than a true indication of the "global diversification" of pirate justice. Whether a consistent alternative to regional trials will be necessary will depend on the outcome of the Kenyan government's ongoing fracas with the international community.

Merry Christmas, and may your holiday season be pirate-free.

Attention Fellow Canadians...

2010-11-23T14:21:00.001-08:00

Come April, keep an eye out for the following on bookshelves near you (cover by HarperCollins):

UK and US covers hopefully coming soon!

CIGI Lecture

2010-11-14T19:48:00.000-08:00

Embedded video of the talk I gave at the Centre for International Governance Innovation on 18 October (better version available on YouTube):

Legal Troubles

2010-11-11T23:39:00.000-08:00

In a major development this week, a senior Kenyan judge has issued a controversial decision that could see as many as 60 suspected pirates released. The ruling is the latest blow to international efforts to prosecute captured pirates, which up until now have relied on Kenyan courts to process the suspected offenders:

Legal loophole could see half of all piracy suspects walk free

The present dilemma is much more the product of a legal gap than a "loophole." Before late 2009, Kenya simply lacked a law allowing its courts to try pirates captured outside its territorial jurisdiction (interestingly, this point had formed the basis for a legal challenge on behalf of 10 pirates accused of hijacking the Indian trading dhow MV Bisaraat in 2006. The appeal was rejected, and the men sentenced to seven years in Kenyan prison).

In an attempt to patch the holes in its legal code, in February 2009 the Kenyan Parliament passed the Merchant Shipping Act, which gave Kenyan courts jurisdiction over piracy offences irrespective of "whether the ship...is in Kenya or elsewhere," and regardless of the nationality of the accused. However, the bill did not enter into force until 1 September; to avoid applying law retroactively, the judge ruled, all pirates captured before this cutoff had to be released.

The irony is that the Merchant Shipping Act itself rests on extremely tenuous legal ground. The 1988 Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against the Safety of Maritime Navigation (SUA Convention)--of which Kenya is a signatory--provides a framework for extraditing suspected piracy offenders under certain conditions. But simply being the only state on the Indian Ocean willing to act as a pirate dumping ground is not sufficient basis for extradition. Kenyan warships are not the ones capturing the pirates, and no Kenyan nationals are involved in the crime, and by extending Kenyan jurisdiction over these cases the Merchant Shipping Act has clearly overstepped the boundaries of international law.

In the end, I suspect the Kenyan government will find some way to bring these men to trial. The alternative would be either a costly repatriation to Somalia, or furnishing them with residency permits and allowing them to remain in Kenya. Given the mounting xenophobia towards the Somali community, it seems unlikely that the government would be able to release dozens of Somali pirates into Kenyan society without incurring a widespread backlash.

The legal regime currently in place to prosecute pirates is in desperate need of an injection of legitimacy. The best course of action would be to establish an international piracy tribunal, headquartered in the region. Though the UN has repeatedly rejected this option, primarily due to the high cost, the international community must recognize that renting out Kenyan courts is not a permanent solution to the problem. With the number of pirate detainees destined to overwhelm Kenya's limited capacities and overcrowded prisons, the Kenyan government's periodic threats to end its piracy trials may soon go beyond mere bluster. Since piracy on the high seas is, at its core, an international problem, an international solution is in order.

Is the AU havin' a laugh?

2010-10-23T09:52:00.000-07:00

Recently, the African Union called for the UN to set up a sea and air blockade of Somalia, with the aim of restricting the flow of weapons into the country:

AU asks UN for Somalia air and naval blockade

The plan is perhaps achievable--if the entire US Fifth Fleet makes Somalia its sole occupation. Somalia has a coastline of over 3,000 kilometres, the longest in Africa, and there are currently over 30 warships patrolling its waters. The European Union's NAVFOR mission, which earlier this year made a naval blockade of the central Somali pirate ports (Harardheere, Hobyo, Garacad) a keystone of its counter-piracy strategy, has been unable to effectively contain the outflow of pirate attack groups. If a taskforce of Western warships is unable to blockade three Somali ports, representing a coastal distance of less than 350 kilometres, then one wonders how the AU envisages its plan being implemented.

If the AU aspires to be treated someday as a serious international body, it should refrain from making such laughable recommendations.

Journalist Nation

2010-10-08T15:47:00.000-07:00

Over the last week, there has been quite a major development in the direction of my career.

With a group of friends, I have begun work on an online international news start up, journalist-nation.com. The site will feature video and other multimedia contributed by users, which will then be fleshed out and editorialized by our staff--transformed, in essence, from YouTube videos into news. Our basic aim is to create a worldwide nation of "citizen journalists," in which our correspondents will be ordinary people on the street--anyone in possession of a cell phone camera, a video recorder, or even a point-and-click.

We're currently attempting to generate an internet buzz and to solicit submissions for the site's launch. If you would like to support us, I strongly encourage you to visit the above link and become a follower of the blog, as well as our twitter and Facebook pages. And please don't forget to re-post and re-tweet--the more the better.

Lastly, if you have any advice, suggestions, or would like to assist in some other way, I would love to hear from you.

CIGI Lecture

2010-09-03T18:34:00.000-07:00

For those in the Golden Horseshoe, I'm giving a joint talk at the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI) in Waterloo on October 18. The other speaker will be Helmut Türk, Vice President of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, Hamburg.

Link below:

Piracy and Terrorism at Sea

Summer Vacation

2010-07-28T12:27:00.000-07:00

With the onset in July of the xagaa, Puntland's second dry season, the Somali pirates have dropped out of the news with their usual punctuality. From now until September the pirates will be on summer vacation, though not by choice; the monsoon winds sweeping off the Indian Ocean make navigating in small attack skiffs too perilous to carry on the pirate trade year round.

When the attacks inevitably resume two months from now, what strategy are the international naval forces going to throw at the pirates? EUNAVFOR's "2010 strategy," which has focused on interdicting pirate attack groups (motherships towing 2-3 attack skiffs) close to shore--before they reach international shipping lanes--has clearly been unsuccessful. In 2010 to date, there have been a total of 44 successful hijackings, on pace to exceed 2009 figures. More alarmingly, the number of hijackings per reported attack stands at 40%--higher than the success rate in 2008, before the majority of the warships arrived.

At each step, the pirates have adapted to the international naval strategy, with ever-increasing success. The "second semester" of 2010 does not seem likely to yield any better results for counter-piracy efforts.

Manuscript Submitted!

2010-07-01T23:27:00.000-07:00

After a year and a half of globe-trotting and cavorting with pirates, I finally finished and submitted my manuscript at the end of last week. There is still plenty of revising and reworking to be done, but for now I will be enjoying a much-needed break from the subject.

Look for The Pirates of Puntland to be hitting shelves in a bookstore near you...in about 8-12 months.

New article

2010-06-25T15:59:00.000-07:00

Just had a new article published, definitely my best.

Pirates, Inc.

Murder on the high seas

2010-05-11T13:14:00.001-07:00

Freed Somali pirates 'probably died'

I am not usually one to protest the harsh treatment of pirates at the hands of the international naval forces; they are, after all, criminals. But leaving ten men adrift in an inflatable boat in the middle of the Indian Ocean, without navigational equipment, is murder, plain and simple.

Especially disingenuous is the Russian Defence Ministry's claim that, after capturing the ten pirates following a firefight on the deck of an oil tanker, that "there were not sufficient grounds to detain them." Both the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, as well as the Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts Against the Safety of Maritime Navigation, make it perfectly clear that piracy is a crime of universal jurisdiction, with any arresting nation having the right to prosecute the offenders.

Murder, however, was a much cheaper option.

Eastward Bound

2010-03-23T19:00:00.001-07:00

In reaction to successful international naval efforts to secure the Gulf of Aden, Somali pirates continue to push into the Indian Ocean:

Somali Pirates move towards India

Hunting pirates is becoming more and more like a game of Whack-the-Mole, as the pirates adapt to each strategy international forces throw at them. Perversely, constant naval pressure may be breeding a higher class of pirate, as groups ranging 1,100 miles into the Indian Ocean require a much higher degree of sophistication--in terms of boats, supply logistics, navigational skills and equipment, and intelligence--than those floating in the Gulf of Aden waiting for a target of opportunity. By necessity, only the more advanced pirate gangs are likely to succeed in the new reality being created by the Gulf of Aden safety corridor...and they are continuing to get more advanced by the day.

Grab that principle before it blows away

2010-02-27T16:09:00.000-08:00

The following Op-Ed, by columnist Melanie Reid, appeared in the London Times' Comment section a few days ago:

Blow the principle. Pay the Chandlers' ransom now

In her article, Reid argues that the UK government should pay the pirates' $2 million (£1.3 million) ransom demanded to release the Chandlers, the British yachting couple captured in October as the Royal Navy watched close by.
"By my reckoning, £1.3 million is peanuts in terms of public spending," Reid writes. "It’s probably what they spend on paper clips in the FCO; or at close to the cost of repairing the upholstery in Gordon Brown’s limousines."
Barely giving her readers enough time to figure out what the FCO's paper clip budget has to do with British policy on ransom payments, Ms. Reid continues her assault on the ministry:
"In 2009 three quarters of FCO staff were given bonuses. And the ministry was criticised this month by the National Audit Office, which found that, since 2002, building projects on embassies had run over budget by nearly £57 million." In other words, enough wasted money to free 43.85 pairs of Chandlers.

Clearly, the most logical way to address this fiscal waste is to break with precedent and pay a ransom high enough to free the entire crews of most commercial tankers (who, to be fair, are generally not white Britons). I am usually offensively unsympathetic to the malcontents who whine about an international media that is so much more attuned to the plight of white people, but in the case of the Chandlers it is an apt criticism. It is because of the inevitable kneejerk demagogueries of journalists like Ms. Reid, who have little understanding of the history or complexity of the Somali piracy issue, that the Chandlers' captors felt confident enough to open negotiations with a demand for $7 million-- equivalent to the highest ransom ever paid, recently paid to free a Greek oil tanker and her crew of 28.

Not only does the British government refuse to pay pirate ransoms, it strongly recommends that British shipping companies follow suit. Indeed, if international shippers had heeded this advice back in late 2008, the piracy epidemic never would have progressed to its current severity. Ironically, the Chandlers suffered as a result of the very purse string-happy prodigality advocated by Ms. Reid.

The Chandlers were among the earliest victims of pirate expansion deep into the Indian Ocean, which began in September of last year. Hijacked more than 1,000 miles from the Somali coast, they were hardly to blame for their unfortunate fate; they were not reckless, they did not flout international piracy bulletins-- they were simply unlucky. Not to pity them would be heartless; to disregard a sound policy would be senseless.
The UK government must stand firm.

2010-02-26T03:04:00.000-08:00

Not related to piracy, but it seems that Gaddafi has climbed out of the deep end and jumped into a deeper pool:

Libya's Gaddafi urges 'holy war' against Switzerland

Congratulations to NATO

2010-02-15T13:12:00.000-08:00

Meant to post this a while back, but anyway:

Danish forces free ship captured by pirates

The first time that a NATO ship has successfully repelled a pirate attack once the hijackers had already boarded the ship. I'm glad NATO is finally getting something for the $400 million (my estimate) they are spending each year on its counter-piracy mission.

Pirate Shootout

2010-01-19T20:29:00.000-08:00

An interesting development...

Pirates have shootout over oil tanker release AP (Katharine Houreld)
Four killed as pirates fight over record ransom (AFP)

After apparently begging international forces to chase off a rival gang waiting to welcome them to shore, four of the pirates who received a record ransom ($7m, according to some accounts) for the oil tanker Maran Centaurus, were killed in an ensuing firefight. To my knowledge, this is the first time an open confrontation has taken place between two pirate gangs. The stakes are getting bigger.

Heroes in a Land of Pirates

2010-01-04T05:52:00.000-08:00

Great news: the New York Times published my Op-Ed piece today, titled Heroes in a Land of Pirates. I'm not exactly sure who the "heroes" in question refer to, but that's not the important thing right now. The article discusses the need to engage Puntland as an international partner in order to tackle the piracy problem.

In other news, my New Year's plane adventure was an epic letdown. As we were taking off I asked one of the stewardesses if they would be serving champagne at midnight, and received a coquettish "We'll see." Not only was there no champagne, there was no countdown to midnight, nor any announcement from the captain or cabin chief, nor any signs of life from the deadbeat passengers. It was not a magical New Year's club, as I had expected, but one of the most depressing places imaginable to spend the night. Good thing I had a whole row of seats to myself-- I slept the entire way.

Barack the Monkey

2009-12-30T21:08:00.001-08:00

Just a brief humourous observation today:

Yesterday, I visited the Nairobi Animal Orphanage, which is a kind of zoo for sick and orphaned animals from the national game park just next to it. In one of the enclosures was a Black Monkey, whose name, according to the placard posted outside his cage, was Barack. I chuckled heartily at the thought of a North American or European zoo doing the same thing; if that didn't make CNN headlines, I don't know what would.

My flight back to Toronto leaves tonight at half an hour to midnight. I am really looking forward to experiencing New Year's on a plane... assuming it isn't delayed, they should have just enough time to break out the champagne before the clock strikes twelve.

AP Article

2009-12-29T04:33:00.000-08:00

Very interesting article in the AP recently: Year after warships come, piracy up.
Stellar analysis--but of course, a journalist is only as good as his sources.

Check it out.

Scourge of the Seas

2009-12-20T11:08:00.000-08:00

Back when I was in Puntland in June, I met and was interviewed by some telejournalists from KTN (Kenyan Television Network), who were putting together a documentary on piracy,
Scourge of the Seas . I didn't think to check up on it until yesterday, after a Somali I met in Eastleigh told me he had seen me on TV. So I watched it, and it turns out that chunks of my interview appear 4-5 times in the course of the production. You can check it out on YouTube (hyperlink above).

The head journalist (and narrator), John-Allan Namu, went on to win CNN's award for best African journalist of the year. I'd like to think the credit is mostly mine.

Nairobi & Mombasa

2009-12-17T04:14:00.000-08:00

My days here in Nairobi have so far has been incredibly promising-- I've gotten many useful leads from my AP and BBC contacts, and things are starting to line up for me. Yesterday I spent most of the day in Eastleigh, Nairobi's Somali ghetto, where I was looking into (trumped up) links between piracy money and the ongoing construction boom in the neighbourhood. I felt like I was back in Somalia-- the people, the language, even the roads were so similar. I talked to a few businessmen and then hit the street, taking advantage of the crowd gathered by a KTN (Kenyan Television Network) film crew to siphon off my own focus group of about 20-30 people.

Nairobi itself is terrific. Bustling, cosmopolitan, friendly people, and outstandingly sunny weather (December-January are the hottest months, and it's not getting much beyond 25c during the day). I could see myself living here for a while. It's a great journalist town.

I'm heading to Mombasa early Tuesday morning, and it looks like I may be there for Christmas (not the worst place to be--I hear great things about the beaches). Through a contact at KTN, I've gotten in touch with the prison warden of Shimo la Tewa, the prison where hundreds of suspected pirates are being held, and she's agreed to give me an interview. I also hope to speak with a number of "pirate lawyers" about the way the Kenyan justice system is coping with the influx. It's an unprecedented legal situation, and the international and domestic legal instruments to cover it are being invented, twisted, and reinterpreted as they go along.

More to follow.

Bucharest Success and Dubai Memories

2009-12-12T15:47:00.000-08:00

I'm sitting in Dubai airport right now, contemplating the eleven hour wait before my connecting flight to Nairobi. I thought about stopping in at my favourite Dubai haunt--the Somali-owned Jubba Hotel--and bargaining with them for a $40 room. But it's too much effort for the middle of the night.

The smells of Dubai (as well as the crowds of Somalis sleeping in the corridors waiting for the bi-weekly flights) have triggered a surprisingly poignant nostalgia for my own trips. I almost wish I was going again.

Bucharest was a big success. With my Romanian friend Teddy as my guide and translator, I managed to track down two former hostages from the MV Victoria, one of the ships I encountered at Eyl during my last trip. The second of these interviews, with the ship's first mate (he called himself "Chief") was unbelievable; he was an amazingly jovial, expressive man who told the funniest stories (though at times I wasn't quite sure if I should laugh or not).

I didn't get to do much sightseeing (and the weather was brutal anyway), but I did get a little local flavour-- I spent my first night on the floor of Teddy's friend's flat, in the heart of Ferentari, the "gypsy ghetto" of Bucharest. Then I spent two of the next four nights at the Hilton, in the nicest hotel rooms I have ever had, thanks to Teddy's mother's client reward program.

Nairobi should be interesting. I have contacts at the AP and BBC, but nothing concrete set up.
More to follow.

Pirate Stock Exchange

2009-12-04T08:34:00.001-08:00

http://www.financialpost.com/news-sectors/story.html?id=2289558

There is no doubt in my mind that this is the product of hyped-up trash reporting (I can just envision the byliner salivating at the thought of a "pirate stock exchange"). Most likely this so-called "stock exchange" is a slightly more formalized method of investing in pirate operations--which has been going on from the beginning. Even if there is only a little truth to it, however, it demonstrates the growing importance of Xaradheere as the centre of pirate operations.

Xaradheere, which is south of Puntland, has really come into its own as the #1 pirate base since the renewed opening of "pirate season" in September. Eyl is not what it once was-- to my knowledge, not one hijacked ship has been taken there in months. My guess would be that this is a result of a) the strengthening of the Puntland government's security apparatus since President Farole came to power in January; and b) the growing distaste for piracy among the local population.

In Geneva now, heading to Bucharest on Monday.

Paradise on Earth

2009-12-02T17:48:00.001-08:00

Had a short-but-sweet stay in Berlin with Jon, scarfing down Turkish Koeftes and enjoying the semi-gay ex-pat sub-culture of the city. I'm inclined to agree with Jon that Berlin shares many characterisitcs with Montreal--poor, super-liberal, and a great night-life.

I'm off tomorrow for a short stop-over in Geneva, the closest thing to paradise on Earth. I've tried to justify my detour by finding some UN cadres to interview (i.e. in the WFP or UNEP), but Geneva isn't even the main offices for those agencies. So I'm just planning to enjoy the weekend and re-live old times with my friend Asger, who I haven't seen since I left three years ago.

Supertanker #2

2009-11-30T02:35:00.000-08:00

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/8385845.stm

800 miles off Somalia... not only the second largest ship attacked by the pirates (after the oil tanker Sirius Star), it is also one of the furthest attacks from Somali waters. It is astounding how far the pirates' range has expanded into the Indian Ocean, and how effectively they have adapted their tactics to the increased naval patrols in the Gulf of Aden.

London Called

2009-11-28T08:51:00.000-08:00

Been in London since the 23rd, staying until the 30th. I've conducted four interviews so far, all of them incredibly informative--probably the best I've ever done (or maybe my perspective has been skewed by the fact that my last twenty or so interviews have been carried out in a foreign language). I talked to the head of underwriting at Lloyd's, as well as a maritime lawyer, a mariner's union rep, and a Chatham House academic.

Going pirate hunting onboard the HMCS Fredericton in a few weeks. My embedding request has gone through (though nothing is guaranteed) and I will join the ship at an undisclosed location from some point in early to mid-January.

Next stop: Berlin, where I'll be dropping in on Jon McPhed and trying to pitch myself to a German publisher.