"Any Somali on the sea is a pirate"

On 7th December the Deputy Commander of the EU NavFor  (Atalanta) officially handed over to the Djibouti navy six outboard motors that had been confiscated from suspected Somali 'pirates'.

It is not uncommon for Somali fishermen to complain about harassment from both the foreign military vessels in their waters and the illegal fishing boats (the IUUs). In July the Italian Navy was linked with the disappearance of three Somali fishermen (Somali Report, 5/07/2011)
Locals have said that the military ships don't differentiate between so-called pirates and fishermen, "It appears that as far as the naval forces are concerned any Somali on the sea is a pirate."

Read more about the foreign military campaigns, the IUUs and the illegal fishing going on in the Horn of Africa.

Another US drone gone

Iran is not the only place that the US has lost a drone. On December 13th a US drone crashed at the international airport in Seychelles.
The drone is one of several that are part of an American military-base in the Seychelles. The US has had a base in the Seychelles since 2009 and the drones are used to surveil both Somalia and the Horn of Africa - the pre-text being to combat piracy. However, they are not used to track or catch the IUUs present in Somali waters, nor are they used to catch the ships that dump toxic waste in the waters off Somalia, waste that comes mainly from European countries and Australia.
It is interesting to note also that just this month, the Seychelles invited China to also open a military base there. Again the pre-text being anti-piracy.
The Horn of Africa continues to be one of the most militarised ocean areas of the world.

Warships Currently Present

Warships present in the Horn of Africa on 8 Dec. 2011:

Australia, China, Denmark, France, Germany, India, Iran, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Portugal, Russia, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Thailand, Turkey, the UK and the USA.

Coalition of the Willing

"It is particularly ironic that many of the nations that are presently contributing warships to the anti-piracy flotillas patrolling, or set to patrol, the waters off the Horn of Africa, are themselves directly linked to the foreign fishing vessels that are busily plundering Somalia's offshore resources," Clive Schofield, University of Wollongong, and author of Plundered Waters: Somalia's Maritime Resource Insecurity 2009.

Fighting piracy off the coast of Somalia is now big business, private security companies and international military forces are all working in the Horn of Africa to combat piracy – that is the Somali 'pirates'. They do not focus on the international shipping fleets poaching the Somalian fish or the international ships that are dumping toxic waste; they focus on the local Somalian people.

Since 2008 more than 30 countries have sent navies to the Gulf of Aden. Most of the G20 countries are active in the area. A large number of international organisations are also suddenly involved in the fight; before piracy off the coast of Somalia became popular, only the IMO and Interpol had policy relating to piracy. Now even the World Bank does. Regional and state organisations such as the EU, NATO, the Arab League and the African Union also have policy or play active roles in the area.

An unprecedented number of Resolutions has been passed by The United Nations Security Council authorising military operations in the area, the most recent in November 2011.
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