The Gulf of Aden hotspot
Piracy is particularly rife in the
adjacent waters of Gulf of Aden near
the Somali coast. Pirates in the Somali
coast, particularly in the Horn of
Africa region carry out advanced
organised type of pirate attacks with
precisely planned strategy for ship and
crew hijack. Their objective of hijack is
simple: ransom. The pirates are well
aware that commercial ships have
negligible resistance to counter the
piracy attempts and as most of these
ships are insured, they have high
potential of gaining a lot from each
big attempts made. The ransom
amount is also quite handsome. For
instance, hijacked in 2008 oil tanker
Sirius Star paid US$ 1 million – US$
3 million and Spanish fishing vessel
Alakrana, hijacked in 2009, paid US$
3.3 million as ransom money.
Generally
ships
hijacked
and
subsequently freed from pirates paying
ransom are unwilling to disclose the
ransom amount.
Southeast Asian waters as new piracy
hotspot
With the increasing dynamism by the
emerging Asian nations, Southeast
16
With the dawn of globalisation the
shipping industry is making bigger
strides to increase volumes of
shipment. It has presented the pirates
tremendous opportunities to attack
commercial ships and seize valuable
and accessible cargo from ships, both
in port or at sea. Piracy is the
outcome of poor economic condition.
Adam J. Young views piracy as “is
largely motivated by poverty and
disenfranchisement
that
afflicts
vulnerable targets like fishermen and
local traders.” Severe hardship of
coastal communities makes piracy a
viable option for changing dire
economic conditions. Organised
criminal groups steadily but increasing
are involving in piracy. For them the
cargoes carrying goods from other
parts of the world are attractive means
to earn a handsome income. Finally,
as it is impossible to guard the entire
waterways and the pirates sufficiently
armed with sophisticated weapons,
piracy is still difficult to check in full
scale.
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The growth of piracy
The widespread growth of piracy can
broadly be attributed to several
elements of globalisation. The ever
growing shipping volume through
seas, poor economic conditions by
perpetrators, organised criminal
groups,
and
limitations
of
enforcement agencies in countering
piracy all play decisive roles.