A
notorious Niger Delta militant has revealed why they have continued to
attack and destroy pipelines even as the government has continued to
plead with them.
Deadly Niger Detta militants called Black Devil
The event followed a now familiar pattern: a small convoy of dusty
4x4 vehicles drove on to the edge of the airstrip at Galkayo in
Puntland, north-central Somalia; armed security guards took up watchful
positions nearby and a number of bemused-looking men stepped gingerly
from the cars and lined up to have their photographs taken by the media.
On this occasion there were 11 of them; all had been hostages until
that morning. They were sailors from a Malaysian cargo vessel that had
been hijacked by Somali pirates a few years ago and held until a ransom
was paid for their release.
One of them gave a brief account of what had happened. "On
November 26, 2010 our ship was hijacked in the Indian Ocean. Their
demand was 20 million. After that, they threatened the owner. You now
increase money or we will shoot the crew. The owner didn't increase the
money and then one Indian is shot with just three bullets. Then they hit
us and tortured us. Tell your family to bring us money, otherwise we
will kill you!"
The crew had been held for three and a half years but they were the
fortunate ones. Five of their crew mates had died in that time. Now the
survivors were going home and a UN plane with two envoys on board was
flying in to see them to safety.
Such scenes have become relatively commonplace in Galkayo in recent
times. Eighty percent of global trade is carried by sea and Somalia
sits on a key maritime route linking Europe and Asia. More than 18,000
ships pass its shores every year. Over the past decade, Somali pirates,
often former fishermen whose traditional livelihoods have been destroyed
by foreign trawlers and toxic waste dumping, have attacked more than
300 vessels and kidnapped 700 people.
Faced with such a threat, the international community responded
aggressively. In 2008, European states, the US and others began sending
naval forces to these seas. They are still there today - warships,
planes and helicopters patrolling thousands of square miles and doing a
fair job of keeping the hijackers at bay. The UN and others have also
played an increasing role in facilitating negotiations for the release
of hostages - such as those set free at places such as Galkayo - for
whose liberty large ransoms have been paid.
But if the problem is now slowly coming under control in Somalia,
the same cannot be said for other parts of the world where piracy is on
the increase. Lawlessness, desperation, poverty, greed and even
political radicalism have brought the phenomenon to the waters of South
America, Asia and, perhaps most aggressively, to West Africa.
In an effort to understand the reasons why, Bertrand Monnet, a
French academic and filmmaker, has been travelling to piracy hot spots
around the coast of Africa. In an extraordinary and very tense series of
encounters, he came to face to face with heavily armed pirate gangs
operating in and around the Niger Delta, where Nigeria's huge offshore
oil industry, which employs thousands of expatriates, offers rich ransom
pickings. It gradually became clear that piracy in West Africa has many
of the same root causes as piracy in Somalia and elsewhere, not least
of which is that those who don't share in the benefits and profits of
global trade have ever fewer reasons these days to respect the security
of those who do.
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