Somali Pirate Attacks

[y66]

From the Pirate Chronicles

 

GAROOWE, Somalia — Abshir Boyah, a towering, notorious Somali pirate boss who admits to hijacking more than 25 ships and to being a member of a secretive pirate council called “The Corporation,” says he’s ready to cut a deal.

 

Facing intensifying naval pressure on the seas and now a rising backlash on land, Mr. Boyah has been shuttling between elders and religious sheiks fed up with pirates and their vices, promising to quit the buccaneering business if certain demands are met.

 

“Man, these Islamic guys want to cut my hands off,” he grumbled over a plate of camel meat and spaghetti. The sheiks seemed to have rattled him more than the armada of foreign warships patrolling offshore. “Maybe it’s time for a change.”

Maybe we could get some of those Islamic guys to rewrite regulatory policy for the Treasury Dept.

[Winstonm]

From the Pirate Chronicles

 

GAROOWE, Somalia — Abshir Boyah, a towering, notorious Somali pirate boss who admits to hijacking more than 25 ships and to being a member of a secretive pirate council called “The Corporation,” says he’s ready to cut a deal.

 

Facing intensifying naval pressure on the seas and now a rising backlash on land, Mr. Boyah has been shuttling between elders and religious sheiks fed up with pirates and their vices, promising to quit the buccaneering business if certain demands are met.

 

“Man, these Islamic guys want to cut my hands off,” he grumbled over a plate of camel meat and spaghetti. The sheiks seemed to have rattled him more than the armada of foreign warships patrolling offshore. “Maybe it’s time for a change.”

Maybe we could get some of those Islamic guys to rewrite regulatory policy for the Treasury Dept.

The C.I.A. needs to hire better fiction writers.

[Lobowolf]

A dash of nano-thermite to make the story plausible.

[Winstonm]

A dash of nano-thermite to make the story plausible.

Or a neocoservative byline to make it clear that it's make-believe.

[onoway]

Something I ran across on an extension of a story about the Somali pirates:

 

"Somali Pirates claim that they are only responding to abuse by the International Community, which has stolen their fish and their livelihood. They claim that foreigners dumped toxic waste there.

Some don't believe it.

Well, here's something you CAN believe:

The UN Special Representative, using money from a Norwegian Oil firm, is engineering a deal where Somalia gives up its claim to a large chunk of its territorial waters to Kenya, including the rights to the oil under the sea there.

 

The so-called TFG Somali Government parliament has not approved any such deal.

 

To Somalis, this looks like one more expropriation of their resources by former colonials, cutting deals with individual politicians who do NOT represent the will of the people. That is going on RIGHT NOW.

 

........

 

The Brussels conference raised $250 Million, then promptly committed to spend it to increase the militarization in the region. Just what they need: more guns and more bullets.

 

The USA is spending about $3.5 Million per day to patrol Somali waters with a naval force designed to fight the navy of another superpower.

That money would have a much bigger impact on reducing Piracy if we gave it to the Puntland government instead."

 

The statement about the U.N. Special Representative screams for an investigation.

 

It's interesting, if true, that the U.S. is so flush with money right now it can spend this sort of money PER DAY in what is basically a negative direction. It may temporarilly stop the piracy, but it does nothing to prevent its recurrance, nor to address the root of the problem. It's like buying tons of coughdrops for a person suffering from T.B. but doing nothing whatsoever about the T.B. (or perhaps more like patrolling outside the house with a platoon and shooting anyone who coughs B) )

.