Somali pirates are truly on rampage now. After capturing in September this year an Ukrainian vessel Faina- loaded with military hardware worth $30 million consisting of Russian T72 battle tanks, grenade launchers and piles of ammunition meant for Kenya- they have, in yet another daring hijack on Saturday night (15th Nov’08), grabbed their biggest ever catch, an oil tanker ‘Sirius Star’ laden with crude oil and owned by Saudi Arabia.
The 330meter long ship at 318,000 deadweight tons is about the size of 3 soccer fields, have only 25 crew from Croatia, Britain, Philippines, Poland and Saudi Arabia and runs on auto pilot most of the time. The ship is worth of $150 million with a crude loading of another $100 million.
The Sirius Star was heading for USA via the Cape of Good Hope with some two million barrels of crude when it was hijacked at about 450 nautical miles (830km) South-East of Mombassa in Kenya, which was far off from the Gulf of Aden area where most of the attacks on ships have taken place.
South Korea announced on Monday (17th Nov’08) that it plans to send a warship to combat piracy in the lawless waters of Somalia. As per the plan, Seoul is likely to send a 4500 tons destroyer carrying missiles and other modern weaponry early next year.
Now let us peep a little bit into the Somali piracy. Piracy in Somalia is a well-organized industry now. It all started some 15 years ago when the Somali Central Government imploded in 1991 throwing the country into a total chaos. With no patrols along the 1880 miles long Somali cost line, the tuna-rich waters of Somalia were invaded by commercial fleets from over the world for fishing.
It is at this point that out of survival instincts, the Somali fishermen armed themselves to thwart foreign trawlers from fishing in their territorial waters and started asking to pay tax for fishing.
From there on they got greedy as time passed. They started grabbing every thing from yachts to small ships to even oil tankers now and are demanding ransoms in millions of dollars. To save the life of crew, the concerned authorities are left with no other option but to pay ransoms that runs into million dollars in some cases.
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