Somali Piracy, The Other Side of The Story
Understanding The Forces Behind The Piracy in Somalia
Apr 22, 2009
Somali pirates took the headlines early this month when they held Captain Richard Philips in captivity for five days. At the end of the drama, it was three pirates down and Philips made a triumphant entry into America to a hero’s welcome. But in October 1993 it was the reverse. 18 American soldiers lay dead and their bodies were dragged on the streets of Mogadishu. Chaos in Somalia reached climax and the UN packed out of this country in 1995. Somalia has not known peace since then.
Somalia in the Proper Context
Somalia today reflects a pattern that defines the contours of Africa’s relations with the outside world. It takes blacks to be massacred in Soweto for the world to acknowledge the cruelty of apartheid. It requires a genocide in Rwanda before the world can appreciate the magnitude of ethnicity in Africa. An American has to be captured before anyone takes a serious look at Somalia, a country that has gone for 20 years without an effective government.
Somalia seems to have fulfilled all the conditions necessary to get world attention. And it is getting it in good measure. “I want to be very clear that we are resolved to halt the rise of piracy in that region,” President Obama said after the rescue of Captain Philips. In 2008, the UN passed a series of resolutions advocating highhanded action to curb piracy in Somalia. Since then, warships of EU nations, China Brazil, Iran and many others have been busy patrolling the waters off Somalia’s coast.
The Roots of Somali Piracy
The root of this problem lies in the economic and political interests of outside players with interests in Somalia. “It was the twin scourges of illegal fishing and toxic waste dumping together with the almost total collapse of governance in the country that contributed to foster the piracy that the EU flotilla and navies of other industrialized nations are now battling,” says Leigh Philips of EUobserver. Andrea Pattison of Oxfam – Somalia agrees, “The piracy [problem] is just one aspect, the symptom of a wider, huge crisis.”
In a historical context, Somalia has been an unfortunate victim of the cold war. “Like Afghanistan,” says Mark Thompson in Time magazine of April 14, 2009, “Somalia was for decades a rope in the tug-of war between the Soviet Union and the U.S., later abandoned and left to rot as superpowers’ interests ebbed.” This abandonment reduced Somalia to complete lawlessness leaving its entire 1.900 miles of coastline exposed to illegal fishing and the dumping of toxic waste from industrialized powers.
Ending Piracy in Somalia
Somalia is receiving considerable attention today because piracy has affected the economic interests of big powers. “While the world has been quick to deal with the issue of piracy – the same cannot be said for action to deal with humanitarian catastrophe engulfing nearly half of Somalia’s population,” admits Ms Pattison. “Its time to show the same urgency about alleviating the suffering of millions of people,” she insists.
Embracing a military option to curb piracy in Somalia is an investment in futility. “There is no purely military solution,” said Robert Gates, U.S Defense Secretary. “It is a serious international problem and is gong to get worse,” he affirmed. The real pirates in Somalia are not those teenagers who, driven by hunger and excitement, jump into water with AK-47s.
“The context that brought about the piracy problem … is the responsibility of European boats, particularly Spanish trawlers, who are fishing illegally in Somali waters,” an anonymous observer told EUobserver. Failed rains and endless political strife have exacerbated the problem of hunger. “There is really no way in my view to control it unless you get something that begins to change the equation for these kids,” insists Gates.
