Ecoterra Somali Marine & Coastal Monitor. Part XXI - Stop the Murder Ship MT Agia Barbara

A very dark story is taking place off the Somali coast these last days. The murder ship MT Agia Barbara is allowed to stay at large, and eventually sail to Yemen, Eritrea or Sudan from where the criminal crew could disappear and escape charges. Even worse, a very unclear situation has arisen with respect to the ownership and the management of the murder ship.

All the details are to be found in the latest press release issued by Ecoterra a few hours ago; I therefore publish it integrally.

Ecoterra Intl. – SMCM (Somali Marine & Coastal Monitor). Part XXI

Ecoterra International – Updates, Statements & Clearinghouse Citations

Celebrating Earth Day (22nd April) by planting a tree and not eating stolen fish !

A Voice from the Truth- & Justice-Seekers, who sit between all chairs, because they are not part of organized white-collar or no-collar-crime in Somalia or overseas, and who neither benefit from global naval militarization, from the illegal fishing and dumping in Somali waters or the piracy of merchant vessels, nor from the booming insurance business or the exorbitant ransom-, risk-management- or security industry, while neither the protection of the sea, the development of fishing communities or the humanitarian assistance to abducted seafarers and their families is receiving the required adequate attention, care and funding.

2009-04-22 23h52:18 UTC

EA Illegal Fishing and Dumping Hotline: +254-714-747090 (confidentiality guaranteed) - email: somalia@ecoterra.net

EA Seafarers Assistance Programme Emergency Helpline: SMS to +254-738-497979 or call +254-733-633-733

"The pirates must not be allowed to destroy our dream!"

Cpt. Florent Lemaçon - F/Y Tanit - killed by attack of French commandos - 10. April 2009

Non A La Guerre - Yes To Peace

(Inscription on the sail of F/Y TANIT shot down on day one of the French assault)

None of the various, local or foreign pirate outfits we like to add -

Clearing-house - Present Trends

Somali Pirates: More aggressive, better armed, better equipped and much more sophisticated than a year ago. Internationally organized criminal gangs take over more and more of the territory, which for the last 10 years was held by moderate groups, who only wanted to defend the Somali waters and arrested vessels for illegal fishing or dumping. The shark- or hyena-function of these defender groups, cleaning the seas also from drug-smugglers, fish-poachers, contraband-shippers and all the other criminal marine ventures, which they attacked with first priority because ransom was easily obtainable from shippers who had something to hide (like the weapons ship FAINA), is slowly diminishing and gives way to attacks against high-value brand-new ships, which bears higher risks (see MV ALABAMA and MT HANDYTANKERS MAGIC) but also brings in the highest returns (see MT SIRIUS STAR).

Families of hostages: Globally the network of families of seafarers, who fall prey to pirates, realize that they have rights and that their consent must be sought concerning any armed intervention first. Families do no longer shut up when told to do so by ship-owners, governments or investigating officers. In several cases the ship-owners only started moving after families involved human rights organizations, the media and the public and thereby achieved the governments to supervise and control the negotiations of owners and risk-managers.

Ship-Owners: Still there are a few serious shipping lines left, which maintain long standing traditions of honest business practices, but the Somali piracy issues bring more and more to daylight the onion-layered, hidden ownership of not so honest shippers, which can only be compared with the high-risk/high-gains of weapons-for-diamonds who flew around the crisis areas of this world during the cold-war days or still fly like the drug-pilots.

Negotiation-Brokers: Still the headquarters for ransom payments is with so called lawyers in London offices and offshoots in Dubai, Bahrain or Muscat, though Somalis, which they had trained as foot soldiers in this business, try to take over and nowadays create more and more havoc. Non-transparency is a character sign of these brokers - to the extend that reputed German news magazine Der Spiegel and the Dutch Handelsblatt reverted to reprinting a syndicated PR article by a former FBI agent, called Jack Cloonan, who obviously tries to promote himself, and tap into his fantasies in order get some ideas of the business, whereby Cloonan had to admit himself that he never had even done an air drop. He even tries to continue the spin, whereby Somali pirate investment had driven Kenyan real estate prices sky-rocketing, while everybody knows in the meantime that mainly churches and other religious congregations besides embassies, international corporations and land speculators are the driving forces. But for the first time someone admitted that their business with the tugboat-owners often cost more than the ransom, which is why the figures of money paid in piracy cases are often all counted on the pirate's heads, while in reality the pirates get not more than around 1/5 of the sums dished out by insurances, who in turn hold themselves fine by just increasing the cost of their policies and pay to their acquaintances in the ransom-business. Ship owners, who can not afford or decline these kind of services have in several cases succeeded in much speedier release operations by talking directly to the pirates and just seeking some expert advise and professional help on the side.

Governments: Question is only for how long the governments want to maintain the façade of "we are not talking to criminals and/or terrorists", while ministers and secret services are fully engaged in the race with the sea-rats. If governments take their duty to care for the well-being of their citizens serious, they can no longer let the ship-owners do what they please. But is that what governments are interested at all? Since Eritrea and Iran signed an agreement granting naval facilities to the Khomeinist military ships, like the Russians did with Yemen and an alignment of military intelligence between the Sudanese and Iranian regimes as well as the Hezbollah's networks could be observed, the whole region might as well be in for much more than just some sailor-and-pirate games. To each decision made by the West and its allies, a counter plan will be applied predicts an Arabic analyst and stated that these are the types of complex threats that twenty-first century terror forces will develop to upset the balance of power - including to drag the "infidels" deeper and deeper into Somalia and then to have them bound and fought by Jihadists - a second Afghanistan in the making in order to pull money and men from the actual Afghan war.

Politicians and Diplomats: Falcons try to portrait falsely that Somali pirates must be classified as "terrorists", because these people - based on their "diplomatic immunity" - then would be the only ones, who legally still could get away with talking to terrorists and thereby could earn money and chips on their shoulders based on the negotiation-and-release business, where so far lawyers and risk-management-companies cash in. If the attempt to profile pirates as terrorists would succeed they actually would push present-time simple criminals into the arms of the fundamentalist strategists and only trigger also a Maritime Jihad.

Navies: What started as a naval exercise to conceal global naval security interests and was branded as intervention to contain the piracy threats as well as falsely claiming the need to protect WFP shipments, has turned into a desperate fully fledged war, which can not be won by the navies. Still the navies are not supervised in what they are doing in Somali waters, do hardly report to anybody except their own governments and do not request the permissions as required by the UN security council resolutions. Though the navies combine all the modern means of destruction - the extremely expensive and legally questionable attempts to catch a mosquito with a nuke will at the end have to stop. But they prepare the ground for the second-in-line business of the military-industrial complex: Training of troops in Somalia and delivery of military equipment paid for by EU and UN money.

Media: Wire services are now in competition with naval intelligence in the game: Who reports first. Assessment: Unhealthy, but necessary: Unhealthy because many cases - if they were not highlighted in the media so much - could be solved quietly faster, but unfortunately necessary, since naval intelligence, governments and ship-owners do not inform or consult the families sufficiently and because serious dangers exist of unwise naval intervention, which jeopardizes the lives of innocent sailors as seen in the case of F/Y TANIT.

Advise: Media hype and copied spin ‘No’, but full transparency ‘Yes’ - and certainly no media-blackout for ill-designed naval attacks. (... kindly also read the article by Alex Stoehlein in the last section of this update)

News from sea-jackings, abductions or newly attacked ships

MT SOLT STRENGTH has left the dangerous Somali coast and is refueled offshore for sailing to the nearest safe harbour while being escorted.

MV ATLANTICA was attacked on 20th April (05h20 UTC) in the Gulf of Aden by two skiffs, each carrying six persons. RPG shots were fired from one of the skiffs but the vessel managed to repel the attack by using anti piracy measures and evasive maneuvering. The vessel was outside the IRTC when the attack happened.

Panamanian flagged MV NEW LEGEND HONOR was attacked on 20th April (11h29 UTC) just 30nm south of the attack on MV ATLANTICA. Two skiffs were involved in this attack and two shots were fired from the skiffs. The vessel increased speed and took evasive maneuvers. The skiffs aborted their attack when a helicopter arrived on the scene.

The Belgian government said Wednesday, according to an AP report, it sent a team of experts to Djibouti to speed the release of a Belgian dredger MV POMPEI and its 10-man crew captured last week by Somali pirates. Interior Minister Guido De Padt says he expects the pirates will likely seek negotiations on a ransom soon with the Belgian companies that own the ship, the Pompei. The stone-carrier, with two Belgians, a Dutch, three Filipinos and four Croatians on board, anchored off the Somalia coast Wednesday, according to the government. It was seized a few hundred miles (kilometers) north of the Seychelles islands as it was sailing to South Africa. Belgium's government crisis center said contact was finally made Wednesday with the captain of the ship, who said the crew was safe and the pirates had made no ransom demands yet. The government is under increasing pressure to send navy ships and personnel to protect merchant vessels off Africa's coastline and it seems as if the hi-jacking of this vessel could be the trigger to

Navies have apparently still not stopped murder ship MT Agia Barbara; still at large !

Crew wanted for murder

The position and route of the vessel with a crew of 6 Syrians and 6 Indians - wanted for murder in Mogadishu harbour - as well as at least one Somali business-agent on board are now roughly known. The small tanker with the IMO number 7616004 and call sign HO4050 flies a Panama flag (possibly now changed). Registered ship owner and manager is MEADOWLARK SHIPPING & TRADING CO. of Piraeus in Greece and the tanker is operated from an office in the UAE.

Please report any sighting.

Meanwhile MEADOWLARK SHIPPING & TRADING CO. claims that it is no longer the owner of the vessel. In an unspecified e-mail an unidentified sender claimed that MEADOWLARK SHIPPING & TRADING CO. is incorrectly registered as owner in the shipping register and that the MT AGIA BARBARA was sold to new owners and would be managed by new managers since September 2008.

The sender further stated that the current owners are WORLD CHAMPION MARINE (the Buyer) not MEADOWLARK SHIPPING & TRADING CO. (the Seller). WORLD CHAMPION MARINE, however, could so far not be traced.

Unconfirmed reports warn that the vessel if not stopped immediately could reach Eritrea or Sudan and the crew disappear from there. The Somali Government has officially requested all navies and coastal authorities to immediately impound the vessel and to arrest the crew.

Vessel picture: http://www.shipspotting.com/modules/myalbum/photo.php?lid=70209

The picture was taken in Greece on April 15, 2004. IMO 7616004. Ex-RYUYO MARU 1976-1989.

Description of vessel

Length: 67.80 m

Breadth: 11.00 m

Depth: 5.06 m

Draught: 4.67 m

GT: 926

NT: 572

DWT: 1.305

Engine Builders & Type: Akasaka Tekkosho K.K. / Akasaka DM33

Horse Power: 1.600 BHP

Built: 1976 Fukae Zosen K.K., Japan (Hull No. 152)

Homeport: Piraeus

Manager in 2004: Delta International Shipping Co. S.A., Piraeus, then Call sign: SW3910

Renamed AGIA BARBARA in February 2008 when sold by Delta International to Meadowlark Shipping & Trading Co., Piraeus, reflagged from Greece to Panama.

No change in ship registers found for alleged sale to so far unknown WORLD CHAMPION MARINE.

With the latest captures and releases now still at least 17 foreign vessels (18 with an unnamed sole Barge which drifted ashore, 19 with JAIKUR I who with its last 5 members of the original crew are still held in Mogadishu harbour) with a total of not less than 288 crew members accounted for (of which 99 are confirmed to be Filipinos) are held in Somali waters and are monitored on our actual case-list, while several other cases of ships, which were observed off the coast of Somalia and have been reported or had reportedly disappeared without trace or information, are still being followed. Over 134 incidences (including attempted attacks, averted attacks and successful sea-jackings) have been recorded for 2008 with 49 fully documented, factual sea-jacking cases (for Somalia, incl. presently held ones) and the mistaken sinking of one vessel by a naval force. For 2009 the account stands at 69 averted or abandoned attacks and 31 sea-jackings on the Somali/Yemeni pirate side as well as at least two wrongful attacks (incl. friendly fire) on the side of the naval forces. Mystery pirate mother-vessels Athena/Arena and Burum Ocean as well as not fully documented cases of absconded vessels are not listed in the sea-jack count until clarification. Several other vessels with unclear fate (also not in the actual count), who were reported missing over the last ten years in this area, are still kept on our watch-list, though in some cases it is presumed that they sunk due to bad weather or being unfit to sail. In the last four years, 22 missing ships have been traced back with different names, flags and superstructures.

Piracy related news

Somalia's president Sharif Sheik Ahmed has said on Tuesday that his government can solve the pirate attacks if the world supports money to the Somali government to form national security forces. President Sharif told Reuters news agency in the Egyptian capital Cairo that it can be possible to protect and solve the pirate attacks in the Somali coasts with in a year if the Somali government gets full support of money from the world to form national security army for Somalia asking the international community to give his government full support. The statement of the Somali president Sharif Sheik Ahmed comes as he is due to attend a conference that will be held in the Belgium capital Brussels which will be attended by many of the international donors for collecting about $ 165 needed to form at least 6,000 national security forces and 10,000 police for the Somalia government and the president said that mentioned amount of money will be enough to be given as salaries for the Somali soldiers to protect the pirate attacks.

The conference follows a UN plea for some 127 million euros (165 million dollars) to support the AU's peacekeeping mission in Somalia and Somalia's own security and police forces, together with some 35 million euros' worth of peacekeeping equipment Diplomats and military commanders agree that the only way to solve the problem of piracy at sea comes not from the navies but will be to stabilize Somalia on land by rebuilding its own law-enforcement system. Somalia's foreign minister urged the international community on Wednesday to help its fledgling government set up a coast guard to fight the rampant piracy that has disrupted shipping in one of the world's busiest waterways. "We will be establishing a coast guard because this is essential for the establishment of the rule of law, both along the coastline and in Somali waters", Foreign Minister Mohamed Omaar told The Associated Press in an interview. Meanwhile the Somali government called for the death penalty for pirates. "Becoming a pirate is a crime, and Islam says if you become a pirate you should definitely be killed because you are killing the people", said Somalia's deputy prime minister, Abdurrahman Haji Adam. Somalia's prime minister, speaking in Addis Ababa, said on Wednesday that foreign navies patrolling off Somalia's coast had failed to discourage piracy "an inch", and condemned firms paying ransoms to sea gangs hijacking ships. "The only reason people (become pirates) is because the companies are deciding to pay ransoms", Omar Abdirashid Ali Sharmarke told reporters.

What Ecoterra Intl. had demanded since 2007 is now backed by more and more voices. Today also Dutch experts in international law said the Netherlands should work with the international community to establish a special international tribunal to prosecute pirates. The current system, under which pirates are only prosecuted if there is a national interest at stake for the arresting country, is just not working. This problem has also arisen especially for the German government, which first bragged itself that it would try all pirates back in Germany but then gave in to the possibilities provided for by an agreement between the EU and Kenya to offload the captives in that East-African Nation, though it is infamous for a flawed legal system and prison conditions, which factually mean the death-sentence even for petty offenders held at the maximum security facilities. Germany followed the presumed easy, but not straight and honest way, which had been paved by Kenya's former colonial power Britain and later the US and the EU.

The best location for a tribunal would be inside Somalia as offered by the Somali government last year in order to have the Somali culprits not disappear from the radar of their kin, but persistent insecurity in the country rules this out for the time being. Despite the fact that still most pirates of the Horn of Africa hail from Somalia - though Yemeni nationals count for an increasing number in these gangs - the international community should live up to its moral obligations and therefore establish an international tribunal for cases of piracy near the seat of the International Maritime Court in Hamburg / Germany. There the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) is already established - it only needs some amendments to fully function also for the trial of piracy cases. The renewed call for such a move comes now from the Netherlands because Dutch navy soldiers from the frigate 'De Zeven Provinciën' on Saturday boarded a fishing boat in the Gulf of Aden with nine Somalis on board who had attempted to kidnap a Greek-owned freighter. The soldiers confiscated machine guns and an anti-tank weapon, and freed sixteen Yemeni fishermen who had been held captive on their own boat while being abused as human shield and for forced labour over the past week. But after interrogating the Somalis, the Dutch commander let the pirates go - in their own speedboats.

Both government and opposition parties in the Dutch parliament now want the government to explain why, reports the Dutch newspaper Handelsbla. Liesbeth Zegveld, a professor in international law, says she is surprised by the navy's decision. Just last month, Defence Minister Eimert van Middelkoop and Justice Minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin wrote to parliament that prosecution of piracy suspects is a matter for the public prosecutor's office to decide. The latter said it wasn't consulted at all by the Dutch frigate. De Zeven Provinciën has a deputy officer from the justice ministry on board, but it wasn't clear how the decision to release the pirates was reached. "You don't leave a decision of this importance to a deputy officer", says Professor Zegveld. "It is strange that the public prosecutor's office was not contacted". The decision whether or not to prosecute detained pirates is left up to the Netherlands because De Zeven Provinciën is part of a NATO-mission and the alliance has not made any agreements about prosecution. The European Union, which has its own mission off the coast of Somalia, has an agreement with Kenya, where several dozens of pirates who were apprehended by European navy soldiers are currently on trial. Why has NATO not made similar agreements?

A NATO spokesman explains that the NATO mission was put together in much less time than the European mission. "There was no time to make agreements with Kenya". But he admits that a situation like the Dutch faced last weekend was "foreseeable". Piracy is the oldest international crime in Dutch law books and can be prosecuted regardless of where it happens and who is targeted. Reuters quoted the commander of another NATO ship in the Gulf of Aden, the Portuguese Corte-Real, as saying his Dutch colleague had no legal power to arrest the pirates. "NATO does not have a detainment policy. The warship must follow its national law", lieutenant commander Alexandre Fernandes said. "They can only arrest them if the pirates are from the Netherlands, the victims are from the Netherlands, or if they are in Netherlands waters. Geert-Jan Knoops, another Dutch professor in international law, disagrees. He says there was no lack of legislation to prosecute last weekend's pirates. International law allows any country in the world to prosecute pirates wherever the piracy was committed. But in their letter to parliament, Ministers Van Middelkoop and Hirsch Ballin said prosecution and detention in the Netherlands is advised only if there is a "clear Dutch interest".

According to Professor Knoops, "The government is covering its bases. They want to be able to say no when prosecution is not convenient". The Netherlands did detain and prosecute five Somalis who hijacked a ship sailing under the flag of the Dutch Antilles in January. "We see piracy as a major problem but this weekend a Dutch ship detains pirates and then frees them", opposition lawmaker Ewout Irrgang said and added: "How can this happen? Do you agree that this is idiotic?" Professor Knoops says, "The existing legislation allowed for the prosecution of last weekend's Somalis too. The fact that they weren't makes for arbitrary justice". Professor Zegveld says she understands the government's position: "They don't want to find themselves with 250 pirates on their hands". But she agrees with Professor Knoops' criticism of the arbitrariness of the judicial system. Germany, Denmark and the US have all let pirates go in the past. The Canadian navy on Saturday faced a similar situation to that of the Dutch frigate. The frigate Winnipeg disarmed seven Somalis in a small boat, and let them go. We have no mandate, the Canadians said.

Professor Zegveld says: "It undermines the international approach to piracy is every country will only prosecute if there is a national interest. International law has to be interpreted more broadly". Both professors advocate an international tribunal for pirates, comparable to the international criminal court. "Then the same rules would apply to all suspects, and there would be specialised prosecutors to deal with piracy. It is high time".

Ecoterra Intl. supports that call, suggests Hamburg as the seat for that tribunal and in addition demands that the "free-for-all" approach to military actions in the Somali waters and on the high seas has to end. This requires a decision that either each nations navy is, can and must be held responsible for what it does or if the navies of several countries join their operations under a specific mandate (like CTF 150, CTF 151, NATO Allied Provider, EUNAVFOR Atalanta) an oversight body has to be established, who is responsible not only to the mandating body (United Nations Security Council, EU, NATO, US-led coalition) but also to the countries affected like Somalia and their nationals. Countries like Somalia, Yemen, Nigeria or states along the Strait of Malacca from where piracy derives must set up independent commissions of inquiry not only to provide accurate information to an international tribunal but also to counter-check the navies enjoined in this battle against piracy. "The present situation where navies zoom through and do whatever they want in the waters of sovereign states, while - based on flawed mandates - hunting factual or presumed pirates and creating havoc among fishermen, refugees or other civilians and do not even request permission or consent from coastal states - as required by international law and also e.g. by UNSCR 1851 for actions in territorial waters - nor report to the affected nation's government or to the mandating bodies, has to stop, because otherwise it will not be far that these unguided operations of navies and the abhorrent lawlessness of the global powers will backfire among themselves", states Dr. Hans-Juergen Duwe, speaking for Ecoterra Intl.

Often the naval officers on board of some naval vessels, which are shoveled around in affiliations with different joined navies do not know in which group they are sailing on a specific day, because their headquarters suddenly flips their status from being an Atalanta vessel to being counted in the NATO's mission or from being a CTF 151 supporter to having to do their own thing based on national interests, states a Naval Attaché based in Nairobi, who spoke on condition of anonymity. When a specific navy ship has a certain, widely acknowledged success immediately the overlords of the numerous naval conglomerates it could be affiliated with boast in the media their pride, but when there is failure, like when the Indian navy blew a Thai fishing vessel out of the water together with its crew which had been held hostage by Somali pirates, they stand alone. If the cowboy-mentality of a "shoot-first-ask-later-or-never" policy is further cultured the one point which gives the moral upper hand in these fights between navies and pirates is lost - and that reason is the safeguarding of justice.

If the supranational criminal activities of Somali piracy gangs (while some analyst still maintain that they are just paid-for agents provocateurs of at least two (EU and US) super-powers in order to push and allow for a specific agenda) and their attacks against innocent merchant ships shall be curbed in a sustainable way, then unbent justice, self-critical high morals and crystal-clear transparency are the three prerequisites to win that fight and essential legs of a global-governance chair, which can neither wobble nor be toppled. But if internationally legal insecurities, atrocities and clandestine operations prevail, their makers must be reminded that those Somalis, who give the world a headache in the moment, are better trained to win in a chaos situation.

Abdiweli Abdulkadir Musse (in Somali language written: Cabdiweli Cabdulqadir Muse, nicknamed "Cadiweli Walo" after his father's nickname "Walo") the Somali teenager took the first day of his trial in the United States for piracy off Somalia, whereby three of Muse's comrades were killed in a US-American rescue operation for the captain. The mother of Abdiweli Abdulkadir Musse wants President Barack Obama to pardon her son because he was misled into joining a sea gang. "My son was influenced by other gangs. He only got into piracy 15 days before he was captured. He is very young and didn't know what he was doing is a crime", said Adar Abdirahman Hassan. "I am appealing the United States and President Obama to release my son", the mother said, adding that Muse is only 16. Muse's father said he was 15, according to Muse's New York lawyer, but a U.S. magistrate agreed with prosecutors after a taped phone-call with the father in camera that he was 18 and ruled he can be tried as an adult. Prosecutors said Tuesday Muse admitted at least three times to being over the minimum age of 18 for being tried as an adult in federal court. On other occasions, however, he said he was younger, and his court-appointed lawyers told Peck that Muse's father told them he was 15. Separately, his mother told The Associated Press he was 16.

In federal courts, juveniles can't be tried as adults without a judge finding it appropriate, and complaints and proceedings against juveniles are not supposed to be public. Peck closed the courtroom for a hearing on the age question, but after testimony from an FBI agent and from Muse's father by speakerphone from Somalia, he concluded the father's claim was not credible and reopened the hearing. "The court has determined that Mr. Muse is not a juvenile", Peck said, noting Muse himself had apologized to an FBI agent for claiming he was younger than 18, and the father had appeared to confuse the age of two of his sons. U.S. prosecutors also say Muse "conducted himself as the leader of the pirates", and have charged him with piracy, conspiracy to seize a ship by force, conspiracy to commit hostage taking and related firearms offences. see: He faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted. But Somalis say their society is highly hierarchical and a youth like Muse would not have led much older men than himself. One of the pirates slain in the U.S. raid was 34-year-old Ali Aden Elmi.

His widow told Reuters that she stopped taking his money when she realised its source. "He was very afraid to tell people that he received ransom shares", Fadumo Osman said. "I stopped taking his money and decided to survive separately. It is dirty money and I could not feed my children on food that he bought with illicit money". A widow of one of the other slain men said she had no idea her husband was involved in any crime. "He told me he was going fishing. He did not show signs of being a pirate. I was very shocked to hear that my husband was surrounded by Americans", said Hamdi Jamac, a mother of three. "I want his remains because my children cannot believe their father was killed at sea. I want compensation for this killing as my children are desperate and have no one that can help". Jamac's mother-in-law also wants the body of her 29-year-old son and compensation for his death. "Killing our sons was not the right decision. The U.S. has to pay the price for what they have done to us. There was another peaceful way of solving the crisis, that would save both the captive and our children", Mulaho Mohamud said to Reuters. The New York Daily News pulled the following up: The last sea piracy trial on U.S. soil may have been in 1861 after the crew of the Savannah hijacked a ship off Charleston, S.C., and then attacked a Navy vessel. The 13 men faced execution if convicted, and the Civil War-era trial generated such enormous interest, hundreds of spectators had to be turned away. The defense argued that the men were not pirates but privateers acting on behalf of the Confederate States of America. Maybe it was a long shot, but it worked.

The trial ended in a hung jury. But then the same newspaper stated in another article: Predecessor [to Abdiweli] in the dock, slave trader Nathaniel Gordon, was the subject of the last hearty piracy trial conducted in New York. Many a tide has risen and ebbed since Gordon was hanged on March 8, 1862, in the courtyard of the Tombs jailhouse downtown. President Lincoln gave Gordon all of three days to get his affairs in order before the gallows. Is that a directional hint? Muse's lawyers, federal public defenders Deirdre von Dornum and Phil Weinstein, said they would continue to pursue the age issue as part of Muse's defense and told reporters that there were signs that Muse might have been an unwilling participant in the piracy plot.

A widely circulated e-mail claims to offer a look inside last week’s Navy SEAL rescue of Capt. Richard Phillips from Somali pirates. The message is credited to retired Rear Adm. Lou Sarosdy, but Sarosdy says he didn’t write it. "I don’t know any SEALs", said Sarosdy, 81, speaking by phone from his home in Pensacola, Fla. "I have no idea who transmitted that. I got it from a friend and passed it to a fairly limited number of guys", he said. "I can’t take any credit". The e-mail "The real story of Obama's Decision Making with the hostages" sounds as follows:

Subject: AH, now it comes out

Having spoken to some SEAL pals here in Virginia Beach yesterday and asking why this thing dragged out for 4 days, I got the following:

1. BHO wouldn't authorize the DEVGRU/NSWC SEAL teams to the scene for 36 hours going against OSC (on scene commander) recommendation.

2. Once they arrived, BHO imposed restrictions on their ROE that they couldn't do anything unless the hostage's life was in "imminent" danger.

3. The first time the hostage jumped, the SEALS had the raggies all sighted in, but could not fire due to ROE restriction.

4. When the navy RIB came under fire as it approached with supplies, no fire was returned due to ROE restrictions. As the raggies were shooting at the RIB, they were exposed and the SEALS had them all dialed in.

5. BHO specifically denied two rescue plans developed by the Bainbridge CPN and SEAL teams.

6. Bainbridge CPN and SEAL team CDR finally decide they have the OpArea and OSC authority to solely determine risk to hostage. 4 hours later, 3 dead raggies

7. BHO immediately claims credit for his "daring and decisive" behaviour. As usual with him, it's BS.

So per our last email thread, I'm downgrading Oohbaby's performace to D-. Only reason it's not an F is that the hostage survived.

Read the following accurate account.

Philips’ first leap into the warm, dark water of the Indian Ocean hadn’t worked out as well. With the Bainbridge in range and a rescue by his country’s Navy possible, Philips threw himself off of his lifeboat prison, enabling Navy shooters onboard the destroyer a clear shot at his captors — and none was taken.

The guidance from National Command Authority — the president of the United States, Barack Obama — had been clear: a peaceful solution was the only acceptable outcome to this standoff unless the hostage’s life was in clear, extreme danger.

The next day, a small Navy boat approaching the floating raft was fired on by the Somali pirates — and again no fire was returned and no pirates killed. This was again due to the cautious stance assumed by Navy personnel thanks to the combination of a lack of clear guidance from Washington and a mandate from the commander in chief’s staff not to act until Obama, a man with no background of dealing with such issues and no track record of decisiveness, decided that any outcome other than a "peaceful solution" would be acceptable.

After taking fire from the Somali kidnappers again Saturday night, the on scene commander decided he’d had enough. Keeping his authority to act in the case of a clear and present danger to the hostage’s life and having heard nothing from Washington since yet another request to mount a rescue operation had been denied the day before, the Navy officer — unnamed in all media reports to date — decided the AK47 one captor had leveled at Philips’ back was a threat to the hostage’s life and ordered the NSWC team to take their shots.

Three rounds downrange later, all three brigands became enemy KIA and Philips was safe. There is upside, downside, and spin side to the series of events over the last week that culminated in yesterday’s dramatic rescue of an American hostage. Almost immediately following word of the rescue, the Obama administration and its supporters claimed victory against pirates in the Indian Ocean and [1] declared that the dramatic end to the standoff put paid to questions of the inexperienced president’s toughness and decisiveness.

Despite the Obama administration’s (and its sycophants’) attempt to spin yesterday’s success as a result of bold, decisive leadership by the inexperienced president, the reality is nothing of the sort. What should have been a standoff lasting only hours — as long as it took the USS Bainbridge and its team of NSWC operators to steam to the location — became an embarrassing four day and counting standoff between a ragtag handful of criminals with rifles and a U.S. Navy warship.

Mohamed A. from Somalia hired a top German lawyer from Frankfurt to take up the case after he was arrested on March 11 in the Gulf of Aden by German marines as he tried together with eight other men to hijack a German container ship. He claims because he was on the German naval ship it was German territory and the proper extradition procedures were not followed when he was moved to a Kenyan jail where conditions were "intolerable". A copy of the claim for damages which was reproduced in Bild newspaper shows that the man wants to have all of his "material and immaterial damages compensated" for what he describes as "an illegal extradition". After he was handed over to Kenya he claims the conditions at the infamous Shimo La Tewa jail north of Mombassa caused him emotional distress. It includes the fact that he's in a small cell with nine other people, the only toilet is a bucket which has to be used in full view of the other men in the cell, there are no beds - only mattresses - and not enough of these for everyone. He also complains that the food is inedible and not suitable for a practicing Muslim. His first hearing in a trial for piracy took place today on April 22 with witness statements and will continue tomorrow.

The first Somali commandeered pirate ship flying a black sail appeared last Sunday in the Gulf of Aden - and was captured by Canadian, British and American warships after a seven-hour high seas chase in the dark a Norwegian chemical tanker was attacked by pirates on a 60-foot black-painted boat flying a black sail. The pirates launched a small skiff that zoomed to the side of the tanker MV Front Ardenne. The brigands raised a ladder, trying to climb aboard, but tanker sped up. The pirates allegedly then fired a rocket propelled grenade, which fell on the deck without exploding, the IMB reported. In reality the Russian crew of the tanker prevented the Somali pirates from boarding their vessel by using onboard fire hoses, a sailors' union spokesman in Russia's Far East said on Wednesday. The Russian crew was delivering the brand new tanker, the HANDYTANKERS MAGIC. The Russian sailors reacted quickly, using powerful fire hoses to deter the pirates. "The tanker's watch crew noticed a ship with black sails in the Gulf of Aden from which a speedboat had left and was heading straight for the tanker", the spokesman said. "The four pirates in the speedboat were preparing an aluminum ladder to climb aboard the vessel. Captain Yury Suponin ordered the crew to attack the pirates using high-pressure fire hoses". The Handytankers Magic was built in China for the Greek company Roxana Shipping and sails under the Marshall Islands' flag. Suponin radioed the Far East Russian port of Nakhodka to inform the authorities that none of the Russian sailors were injured during the pirate attack. The tanker is now passing through the Suez Canal on its way to Europe. The pirates finally aborted their attack and fled when NATO forces arrived. A Canadian frigate, a British supply ship and the Halyburton, a U.S. frigate, chased the black ship for seven hours before capturing and disarming the maritime bandits.

The French naval frigate Nivose under a special agreement with the EU delivered 11 Somalis accused of piracy to the Kenyan authorities together with two flimsy open boats, grappling hooks and several assault guns. French commandos captured the men last week after an alleged attempt to hijack the Liberian-flagged tanker MT SAFMARINE ASIA, 550 miles (900 km) east of Mombassa. Masked French commandos marched the band of barefoot, glum-looking pirate suspects down the gangplank of the warship Wednesday in the Kenyan port of Mombassa before turning the 11 Somalis over to Kenyan authorities. Anti Lehmus Jarvi, an EU legal adviser, said - according to the BBC - he had spoken to the Kenyan prosecutor and the suspects will be taken to court and charged. This is the first time France has turned over seized pirates to Kenya, while 12 alleged pirates from earlier arrests as well as the detained culprits and witnesses! from the fatal F/Y TANIT attack, where one of the hostages was killed most likely by French forces are handled in French courts.

Anti-piracy measures

Somalia's President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed has called on pirates to stop attacking ships off the country's coast. In an exclusive interview with VOA Somali service, President Sharif says the pirates are putting Somalia in a very risky situation with what he called their "dangerous" actions. He said the pirates' activities are forbidden by Islam and are doing terrible things to Somalia's culture and traditions. Regarding Somalia's security situation, President Sharif said insurgents should stop fighting the [internationally recognized] government now that parliament has approved plans to institute Islamic law throughout the country. Reuters reported that Somalia's president cautioned on Wednesday against any U.S. strike on the land bases of pirates who have seized dozens of ships off his country's coastline, saying such an attack would have no positive effect Somali President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed told a news conference in Cairo that he preferred instead to strengthen Somali police forces to act against Somali buccaneers who have made millions of dollars seizing vessels in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean.

Asked about a possible U.S. strike, Ahmed said: "We advise against this ... because strikes like these rarely hit their marks". "Training and arming the Somali forces is what will secure an end to this phenomenon", Ahmed said. "The idea now is to strengthen the Somali police force so they can pursue them, and to establish a coast guard whose mission would be to protect the Somali coast and prevent pirates from attacking passing ships". U.S. officials are reportedly also wary of action that could lead pirates to seek common cause with Islamist militants such as Somalia's al-Shabab group, but have ruled out military strikes on land so far. Meanwhile American aid agencies today urged the Obama administration to consider humanitarian needs in its policy review on Somalia.

The European Union's executive is to pledge at least 60 million Euros (77.6 million dollars) to boost security and fight piracy in Somalia at a donor conference on Thursday, officials in Brussels said Wednesday. "The European Commission will pledge at least 60 million euros to support Somalia's security institutions and the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM)", a statement released in Brussels said. The conference, to be held in Brussels, "is critical for tackling the root causes of piracy in the international waters off (Somalia's) coastline", the statement said. The conference is to be co-chaired by United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and African Union Chairman Jean Ping. They are set to be joined by European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso, Somalia's President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, and the secretaries general of the Arab League and the Organization of the Islamic Conference, Amr Mussa and Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu.

Illegal fishing and dumping

The European Commission has said it is ready to investigate and take action against any European boats or European-owned fishing companies that fly flags of convenience that engage in illegal fishing off the coast of Somalia, according to a report by the EU Observer. This month, Prof. Abdurahman Ibbi, the Somali deputy prime minister and minister of fisheries and marine resources in the new Somali national unity government, said that an estimated 220 foreign-owned vessels were still engaged in unlicensed and illegal fishing in Somali waters, most of them of European origin. The European commissioner for fisheries, Joe Borg, on Wednesday (22 April) told reporters that he had no information regarding Mr. Ibbi's allegation. "I am certainly prepared to look into it if we are provided with specific details on this", he said during a press conference presenting a paper reviewing the state of the European Common Fisheries Policy. "But the information I have is that it is nowhere near close to those figures that have been mentioned. But certainly ... if we see that there are any European fishers or European-owned vessels that are operating illegally, there are ways and means whereby ... we can have those vessels blacklisted as IUU operators if they are operating illegal fishing".

He said that one way this could be achieved would be via Regional Fisheries Management Organisations (RFMOs) and that the commission had already tried to tackle the issue of tracking down illegal fishing boats near Somali waters at the international level. "The only pity is that the commission has tried within the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) to introduce such measures [to get the IOTC also to chase down illegal fishers], but it wasn't supported by the majority of partner countries within IOTC over the last couple of weeks". At the same time, the commissioner said he felt other regions bore a heavier responsibility for illegal fishing in the region. "I would be the first to say that our fishers are not the major culprits when it comes to illegal, unregulated and unreported [IUU] fishing".

He added that the commission is working to end illegal fishing in Somali waters and elsewhere: "This problem needs to be addressed", he said, "and we are introducing measures which will come into effect from 1 January 2010 in order to bring about a situation where fish that cannot be certified as legally caught cannot end up on the plates of the European consumer". Illegal fishing over the last two decades by European boats and European firms that operate boats that fly flags of convenience - when the nationality of the owner is different from the country of registration - as well as the regular dumping of toxic waste in Somali waters by Swiss and Italian companies has been described by analysts and development and green NGOs as the twin root causes of the current piracy crisis. Spain meanwhile has requested that the issue be discussed at Thursday's meeting of EU fisheries ministers in Luxembourg, and will inform the fisheries ministers about recent attacks by Somali pirates on vessels inside the Seychelles fishing zone and northeast of Madagascar.

More openly the EU Fisheries Commissioner Joe Borg told the Associated Press that the EU is looking "to see what can be done to bring about more security and protection for the fishers who are legally operating in those waters" and stated that he wants to improve maritime security off Somalia to bring European boats back to fish the tuna-rich grounds. He is under severe pressure especially by French fishermen, who blocked in protest to not increased fishing quotas several French harbours. There they are called strikers but in Somalia the defenders of their own fishing rights are called pirates. The EU Observer's writer Leigh Phillips quoted one [unnamed] senior commission official as having been more critical of the Somali minister's allegation, saying that he had to deal with similar "facile and stupid rumours" in 2008.

He said that having checked satellite readings, they found no EU-flagged ships in Somali waters at the time. He added that they had counted only 50 to 60 such vessels engaging in illegal activities in the region over the last ten years. Nevertheless, he conceded that there was indeed a problem in Somali waters with fishing by boats owned by European companies but that fly flags of convenience. "It's rare that purse seiners do this as they are very large vessels, but there are lots of little long-liners that engage in this practice. Lots".

What angers the EU official most likely more is the fact that Somalia's new government has declared all foreign fishing licenses (which mostly were issued anyway illegally) had been withdrawn and for the time of a moratorium while new legislation is put in place and the fish stocks are assessed no new licenses would be issued. That EU official obviously has also no idea about the simply not given capabilities of satellites to detect flags of vessels and the unnamed commissioner should realize that even if the tuna-fleets are equipped with AIS transponders (which is not a satellite based system) nobody controls it when these units are just stored on the mother-ship of the fish-poachers outside the 200nm zone, while the catcher vessels penetrate deep into Somali waters. The Long Range Identification and Tracking (LRIT), which is satellite based, is not installed in fishing vessels, since the system, which came into force on January 1st 2008 with compliance required by 31st December 2008 requires only the following classes of vessels to comply: Passenger ships, including high-speed craft; cargo ships, including high-speed craft, of 300 gross tonnage and upwards and mobile offshore drilling units.

A proactive step into the right direction therefore would be to demand LRIT installations for all fishing vessels linked to European owners or ventures and to allow for independent monitoring, as demanded by Ecoterra Intl. since long. The EUobserver reported on Tuesday that illegal fishing by European-owned boats with flags of convenience continues to be reported - particularly Greek ships. According to the Somali Marine & Coastal Monitor update from April, these vessels belong to the Greek firm Greco Ltd. and have reportedly flown Cambodian and Panamanian flags. "It's very difficult to deal with this, although new legislation in January will help", the commission official added. "At the same time, there are other, financial, political ways of tackling the problem. Once given evidence of this, the commission is ready to take action, indeed we are obliged to do so, but without evidence we can do nothing" he said, placing the ball in the Somali government's court.

Julie Castor, of Oceana, the environmental group that focuses on threats to the sea and that has long been studying illegal fishing in the region, said that it is important that the commission and EU member states distinguish between the EU-flagged illegal fishing, which has indeed declined since the pirate attacks began to explode, and illegal fishing by European-owned vessels that fly flags of convenience, which continues to occur. While the Spanish Government itself admits only to know about 20 Spanish flagged vessels and 14 of Seychelles flag but of Spanish property (8 tunny boats and 6 aids) it could not specify how many more vessel with Spanish ownership fly other flags of convenience and fish in the Indian Ocean. And its not only the Europeans: There are currently 3337 IOTC "authorized" vessels from 28 flags in the IOTC Record (last update: 2009-04-16) and many more on the unofficial list of the OPRT, a Japanese lobby group for industrial fishing, which all harvest mostly uncontrolled from the Indian Ocean.

No real peace in sight

At least 10 people were killed including civilians in central Somalia Monday after fierce fighting erupted among Islamist factions. The fighting erupted around noon and was still continuing into the early evening, as fighters loyal to the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) rulers in Hiran region and Hizbul Islam faction fought for control of Beletwein, the provincial capital. The battle was preceded by an overnight explosion, where an employee with Somali money-wiring transfer Amal Express was wounded after a hand grenade was thrown into his home. A female relative was also wounded the blast and both victims were taken to Beletwein General Hospital, witnesses said to Garowe online radio. Fighters loyal to the ICU administration in Beletwein driving three armed trucks were reportedly searching for the attackers Monday morning when they arrived at a base belonging to Hizbul Islam faction, independent sources told Puntland-based Radio Garowe. At least 32 wounded victims were rushed to two local hospitals. Medical sources confirmed that 23 victims were being treated at Hiran Voluntary Hospital and 9 wounded victims were admitted to the Beletwein General Hospital, operated by the MSF-Swiss aid group. Traditional elders and religious clerics are reportedly spearheading efforts to stop the fighting. ICU officials in Beletwein have not commented publicly about the battle, but Hizbul Islam members blamed the ICU militia for "attacking" their base. Hizbul Islam was formed last January when four Islamist factions merged to form a united front and fight against the interim government, led by ex-ICU chief Sheikh Sharif Ahmed. In 2006, all of Somalia's Islamist groups were united under the ICU banner but the movement broke apart during the U.S.-American instigated and backed Ethiopian army's two-year military intervention in Mogadishu and other parts of south-central Somalia.

A Somali aid worker was killed during the night to Monday by unidentified gunmen. The local media reported that Omar Sharif, who worked for the aid agency Care International, was shot dead in the southern Somali port town of Merka (around 90km south of Mogadishu) by masked gunmen outside a mosque, killing him on the spot. "The gun men opened fire on innocent Omar and they escaped from the scene after the incident", Hussein Adde, a resident of Merca told APA by telephone. The town is under the control of Al-Shabab Islamists who control most of southern Somalia since last year. Local authorities have opened an investigation into the motives of the killing and identity of the gunmen.

Two European doctors kidnapped in Somalia are in good health, a local elder told AFP Monday, adding that the militia holding the pair were demanding money to release them. The aid workers, a Dutch national and a Belgian employed by Medecins sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders - MSF) were snatched by gunmen on Sunday on their way to Hodur, near the Ethiopian border. "We have seen the hostages this morning and they are doing well but the militiamen are insisting on a ransom being paid for their release", Mohamed Ali Yunus, a local clan elder who is involved in the negotiations, told AFP. "They did not ask for a specific amount of money but they said that they needed some money to release them", he added. Members of the local aid community also said that the kidnappers were demanding a ransom for the doctors' release. "The militiamen are accusing the local authorities in the region of levying taxes from the aid agencies and receiving no share", one aid worker said on condition of anonymity. "Their aim is to get some money to release the aid workers", he added. Another elder in the region was hopeful the kidnapping could be resolved quickly. "We are hopeful that the gunmen will release the aid workers peacefully, soon after our negotiations come to an end", Edin Malag said. Gunmen have demanded a $1 million ransom for the release of three aid workers taken over the weekend in Somalia, a local elder said today.

"We came back this morning with empty hands", said elder Aden Isak Ali from Rabdhure town, near where gunmen seized a medical team from the charity MSF-Belgium. Attacks on relief organisations, normally blamed on Islamist rebels or clan militias, have forced groups to scale back on humanitarian operations. A leader of the militant al Shabaab Islamist group, which governs the south-central Bakol region where the kidnapping happened, said his forces had tried to chase after the gunmen. "Our forces tried to free the aid workers, but we came back to Hudur town", said Sheikh Aden Yare in Hudur, the Bakol capital. "The kidnappers went with the foreigners out of the region and so we could not reach them. Our car overturned in the course of tracing them, and six of our fighters were injured", he told Reuters. MSF in Brussels had earlier confirmed that two male doctors from Belgium and Holland had been kidnapped and the Belgian office of Doctors Without Borders said it had not yet had any contact with the people who kidnapped two aid workers Sunday in Somalia. Fabienne de Leval, Brussels deputy director of the aid organization, says she has no information on why the two were kidnapped. She said Monday the group is doing all it can to talk to local officials and others who could help secure the pair's release.

The aid workers were abducted by 25 masked gunmen in the Bakool region. Four World Food Programme employees have been killed in the Horn of Africa country since August last year and four European aid workers employed by the French NGO Action Contre la Faim (Action Against Hunger) as well as their two Kenyan pilots are still held hostage since November 2009. MSF is among the few international aid agencies still operating in Somalia, where wide insecurity and violence impede international staff from assisting the population. Based on UN estimates, Somalia is one of the world's worst humanitarian crises situations with over a third of the population depending on international aid. Also two international journalists, Canadian Amanda Lindhout and Australian Nigel Brennan are held since 23rd August last year in Somalia - without that neither the Australian investigators nor the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, who have send staff to Nairobi in neighbouring Kenya, seem to have come a single step closer in achieving a release.

Impacting news from the global village

The directive Philippine President Gloria Arroyo has issued banning the deployment of Filipino seamen on ships that sail through the Gulf of Aden, has been criticized as a too short step into the right direction. Filipino seafarers who work for the global merchant fleet deserve more intelligent consideration from their government about how best to mitigate their risks, states Lloyds List. President Arroyo says the sea lanes near Somalia are far too dangerous, but it is not clear how the ban will be enforced. Filipino seamen are extremely popular as they are willing [or forced] to work for exceptionally low wages. Nearly 100 Filipino seamen are currently being held by Somali pirates. Though the drastic directive immediately triggered that finally the owners of MT STOLT STRENGTH, who had dragged their feet for over 5 month, concluded the release deal, many analysts say that the Philippine government should much more control the employment conditions of their seafarers, the working and safety conditions on ships, which hire Filipino seamen and last but not least care more for the fast release of seized vessels with Filipino crew while not leaving the negotiations just to ship-owners or manning companies.

Navies from the United States and 11 other countries on Monday launched two weeks of war exercises off Florida's Atlantic coast that will include training in combating piracy and drug smuggling. Beside the U.S., Canada and Germany, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru and Uruguay are taking part in UNITAS Gold, which is the U.S.-Navy's longest-running yearly exercise - since 50 years - and costs the U.S. alone in excess of $7 million - money, which would be better spent to tackle the root causes of piracy. More than 25 ships, four submarines, 6,500 sailors and 50 aircraft are taking part in the exercise hosted by the U.S. Navy's 4th Fleet. Rear Adm. Joseph Kernan, commander of U.S. Naval Forces Southern Command and of the U.S. 4th Fleet, noted that multi-national forces are combating piracy off Somalia and said exercises such as UNITAS will help nations coordinate efforts to oppose that scourge. He said, according to AP: "If piracy proliferates into the region, my belief is that exercises of this nature will allow us to address it effectively". Analysts maintain, that if the underlying causes of piracy in Somalia, Nigeria or the Strait of Malacca are not tackled, the pirate-business-model for pirates, brokers and lawyers might very well spread.

Ogaden rebels backed a call launched by a genocide watchdog to investigate genocide allegations in the south-eastern areas of Ethiopia. In a letter sent to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the NGO Genocide Watch requested to investigate extra-judicial killings, rape, disappearances, destruction of livelihood and the displacement of thousands of Anuak ethnic group who live in a remote section of southwestern Ethiopia. The rights group said the Ethiopian army had continued into late 2005 before finally subsiding when the same Ethiopian National Defense Forces were moved to the Ogaden area of southeastern Ethiopia and into Somalia "where similar atrocities were and still are being committed. The Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) strongly supports the call by Genocide Watch for the initiation of an investigation of the human rights situation in Ethiopia", said the rebel group which fight for the independence of Somali ethnic group in Ogaden.

The ONLF also accused the Ethiopian government of committing war crimes tantamount to Genocide in Ogaden. The rebels further said a UN humanitarian assessment team had visited Ogaden in September 2007 and concluded that an independent investigation was warranted. The ONLf regretted that "this recommendation was never acted upon and the details of their findings with regard to human rights were never fully released". Genocide Watch said they were encouraged by the action of the International Criminal Court’s Chief Prosecutor against the Sudanese President Omer Hassan Al Bashir and the decision issued by the judges of the court for his arrest on war crimes committed in Darfur region. "The action that the International Criminal Court has taken in this situation has restored hope to peace and justice loving people, affirming that international human rights law not only exists on paper, but in reality", wrote the Gregory Stanton, President of Genocide Watch. He added that atrocities fears of impunity may be a "primary reason that one of the first leaders to defend Omar Al-Bashir and condemn the warrant was Prime Minister Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia".

Welcome to a world without foreign correspondents
By Andrew Stroehlein

We've all watched the cutting of foreign news budgets for so long that we've become almost numb to it. Another bureau cut here, another three correspondent posts dropped there -- drip, drip, drip -- the dwindling capacity of overseas news gathering is constant background noise. Or ever-increasing silence, perhaps. But now we've come to two situations that show us what the world will be like when there are no foreign correspondents left.

The first is Somalia, where the utter inanity of foreign news coverage in the West, particularly in the US, knows no bounds. Amid deafening hero-worship and chest-thumping, the US media machine was so proud that a new president with the world's largest military at his disposal can kill a couple lightly armed thugs that few seemed even able to grasp the most basic fact of the situation: piracy is symptom, not the disease, and lawlessness off the coast of Somalia will continue as long as anarchy is allowed to continue on land. If only a tiny fraction of the Western media ruckus of recent weeks could be dedicated to Somalia itself, then international political attention might start focusing on the roots of the problem.
But the danger on the ground makes Somalia extremely difficult to cover for foreign journalists, so we're stuck with stories of tangential importance, written like Hollywood film scripts from editorial offices thousands of kilometres away.

Some outlets, like the Independent in the UK, are sending reporters to the refugee camps in Kenya so at least the story of the enormous human cost of the Somali conflict is known. Most others are at best tagging on a sentence or two at the end of their stories, pointing out that Somalia is a failed state. However, discussion of the international community's political options is pretty rare, leaving an endless loop of despair: Somalia's been a failed state for so long, the world cannot imagine it any other way -- even if it results in piracy and growing extremism that threaten us, not to mention great human suffering among the inhabitants.

The other example of a crisis unfolding mostly not before our eyes is Sri Lanka, where over the past few months the situation in the north east has become incredibly desperate for some 150,000 civilians trapped in an ever-shrinking "safe zone" between their government that is shelling them and the cult-like LTTE rebels who shoot them if they try to escape. Today, as my colleague writes, "A mass slaughter of civilians will take place Tuesday at noon. And everyone knows it". Once again, foreign correspondents are unable to cover the story, this time because the government is not allowing them in to the region.

Some Western media are trying to cover this deteriorating situation, and in particular, the UK and other European countries have been running some shocking new video of the victims. BBC World Service radio has keeping it generally high in the news order. But try to find this enormous catastrophe on American TV... Good luck.

Instead of any of these issues of political relevance and deep humanitarian concern, Americans get coverage of would-have-been obscure UN conferences, which are supposed to seem interesting because they are boycotted. Or, more likely, they get ratings-hungry hate-rants against creeping socialism and indignation at blatantly astroturfed "tea party" tax protests.

Too bad Al Jazeera English is not available on most living room screens in the US, and people there have to choke down the endless rotting fish heads of celebrity news or the same tiresome group of ignoramuses shouting at each other in a studio -- both the cheapest forms of filling air time after a test card.

What ties all this together is ignorance of foreign affairs in news media due to a lack of correspondents on the ground. In the current cases of Somalia and Sri Lanka, mind you, the obstacles to reporters covering the stories are larger than normal budgetary issues of staffing cuts abroad. But the point is these situations show us what it's like when Western news organisations -- for whatever reason -- do not have long-serving correspondents on the ground: when they have no eyes and ears following the situation directly, understanding the complexities and able to report more deeply than "hero saved" or simply ignore it all together.
A respected staffer in a field bureau is able to call the editor back home and say, "there's something big going down here", "in all my years here, I've never seen anything like this before", and "this is news; we need to cover this". Without anyone making that pitch internally, the chance of missing out is always going to be greater.

And so with these two crises, we now understand what it will be like when the last foreign correspondent collects her last month's salary and turns out the lights in the last overseas news bureau. We'll get superficial coverage of issues that are actually hugely important, we'll miss real threats to our own security, and we'll miss mass murders in progress.

Abu Dhabi fisheries company Asmak ASMK.AD is considering tuna-ranching in waters off the Seychelles archipelago, the head of the Seychelles Fishing Authority said. The company has signed a six-month memorandum of understanding, under which it will also look into developing the Seychelles capital Victoria into a major fisheries hub to rival leading Asian tuna centers.

Neither Asmak nor the SFA have disclosed how much the company is looking to invest. But Mohamed Salim Makwana, Assistant General Manager of subsidiary Asmak International Fish Farming Holding Co confirmed that a memorandum of understanding had been signed covering investment in the Seychelles fisheries sector. As the financial crisis highlights the risks of an economy heavily dependent on tourism, the Seychelles wants to diversify its indebted economy and develop its fisheries industry. "The idea is to turn Victoria into a tuna trading hub to rival the likes of Bangkok", said Rondolph Payet, Chief Executive Officer of the para-state Seychelles Fishing Authority (SFA). "The tuna ranch will involve off-shore cages where the tuna will be fattened up before export to Asia and Europe", he said.

Some 50 foreign tuna vessels offload their lucrative hauls in Victoria. The port handles up to 350,000 tonnes of tuna a year, but two-thirds of this is transported immediately to overseas markets. While demand for the Japanese delicacy sushi can push the price of tuna to over $100,000 per fish [Bluefin Tuna], fisheries account for just 3 percent of Seychelles $900 million economy. "We need to add value to the [Yellow-fin] tuna that is unloaded here in Seychelles, whether it is stored here for longer or traded here", Payet told Reuters by telephone.

Conservationists fear such intensive fish farming projects could jeopardize the Seychelles' pristine marine environment which draws some 150,000 visitors to the archipelago every year. The greatest risk would come from introducing new species at a later date, Nirmal Shah, head of conservation group Nature Seychelles, told Reuters. "The danger is that you bring in new diseases. And if fish escape, they become an invasive species", he said. "Yes, we need investment and improved food security, but this must not jeopardize the environment". The SFA says the cages would be far from the coral reefs that fringe the archipelago, in water at least 100 meters deep, but seem not to take into consideration the many negative lessons learned already from other failed off-shore caged fish-farming ventures.

Press Contacts:

ECOP-marine
East-Africa
+254-714-747090
marine[at]ecop.info
www.ecop.info

ECOTERRA Intl.
Nairobi Node
africanode[at]ecoterra.net
+254-733-633-733

EA Seafarers Assistance Programme
SAP Media Officers
+254-722-613858
+254-733-385868
sap[at]ecoterra.net

End of Ecoterra press release

NOTE
Picture: the murder ship MT Agia Barbara
From: http://www.shipspotting.com/modules/myalbum/photo.php?lid=70209