Pirates of Puntland and The World Press

Somalia diary: a day in Boosaaso, the capital of Puntland's pirate coast

From: telegraph.co.uk

It may look like a poor and sleepy African port, but Boosaaso in Somalia is a land of opportunity to anyone with piracy in mind.

From the airport, we head off into town, having picked up a group of Kalashnikov-toting gunmen en route, for whose services we're paying $20 a day each.

They are actually employees of the Puntland Ministry of Security, although this doesn't mean they're exactly Special Branch standard. Dressed in shabby brown fatigues and aged about 16-60, they make us look pretty much like any other African militia outfit as we bump down the pot-holed road into town in two pick-up trucks.

It's hard to have great confidence in them. On that kind of money, I suspect they'll just melt away should we get attacked. The only thing worse than that would be for them to stand and fight, in which case we would probably end up in a blood bath. Yet few people I know who've been to Somalia have ever visited without this kind of full-scale VIP escort. It is, I suspect, as much a job creation scheme as a genuine security measure.

Boosaaso is one of the more prosperous Somali cities, because of the relative stability that Puntland has enjoyed over the last decade or so. Largely free of the interfactional warlordism that has blighted the rest of the country, its population has grown from around 50,000 to 500,000 in the last 10 years as people have fled the fighting in the capital, Mogadishu.

Many of the émigrés who come here see it as the local answer to America, the Land of Opportunity, although it isn't exactly flourishing. The town itself is dirt poor and much of it looks like a refugee camp, with hardly any proper roads and many people living in thatched lean-tos on street corners. Foreign investors are understandably reluctant to come, and at the moment the only industry is the export of boatfuls of hardy livestock that sail out of the port - goats, camels and sheep, plus sacks of dried shark meat. It's no wonder, then, that a spot of piracy is for many Somalis one of the Land of Opportunity's more tempting prospects.

Our hotel, called "The International Village", is a heavily-guarded villa on the outskirts of Boosaaso, patrolled by numerous armed guards and also a large and belligerent ostrich, which snaps irritably at anyone who comes too close. Locals refer to the International Village as Boosaaso's answer to the Sheraton, and while there is no hot water in the shower, it's pleasant enough. Which is just as well, given that we are confined here at all times whenever our two carloads of armed guards aren't around.

Luckily, this is also where anybody who's anybody in Boosaaso hangs out. In the car park I bump into the Puntland interior minister, while having a cup of tea on the verandah is the minister for travel and tourism. Both of them I collar for a quick grilling on the subject of piracy. It's a pleasant change from my normal trips abroad, where getting an audience with any high-up invariably requires endless faxes, phone calls and general brown-nosing. We've barely been here an hour and we've interviewed half the cabinet already.

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From: ComingAnarchy.com

Somali piracy has become a major news item, and most are blaming Somalia´s chronic anarchy. In truth, the pirates have become a highly organized business that originates in the stable civic society of Puntland in the north, not the chaos of the warring south.

Somali pirates who previously targeted small vessels have grown in sophistication and have now hijacked luxuy liners, container ships, and now supertankers.

Somali piracy has been headline news over the past half year. In April, pirates off the coast of Somalia took control of Le Ponant, a French luxury yacht. In October, the Ukrainian cargo MV Faina was captured, which included in its hold 25 armormed tanks. And earlier this month, a tanker carrying oil up to $100 million in value was hijacked off the coast of Somalia. Shipping "war insurance"—covered previously at CA here—is becoming expensive, as ships such as the Sirius and Le Ponant, previously thought to be beyond the grasp of pirates, are now seen as vulnerable. The range of the Somali pirates is growing as well. Until just last month, ships were thought to be safe if they kept 200 nautical miles from Somalia, but the Sirius Star was 450 nautical miles from the coast when it was hijacked in a lightening 16 minute takeover. Read how another tanker captain avoided capture with S-manuevers and other unpredictable navigation here.

Some analysts write fearful tracts that the pirates have links with terrorists and extremists, that the chaos is a direct result of international neglect of Somalia, and try to link pirates to the islamist insurgency that control much of the south or the recent terrorist bombings in Somaliland. This is nonsense. The origins of Somali piracy are not found in the southern half of the country, where a "transitional government" is dueling the Union of Islamic Courts with the half-hearted assistance of the Ethiopian military. Somali piracy originates in Puntland, a self-declared autonomous region of Somalia at the horn, hailed for years by policymakers as a model of a stable Somali state.

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Somalia: Puntland home of the pirates?

From: EagleSpeak.us

One man finds corruption in a part of Somalia like Puntland:

Not surprisingly, the official line among Puntland´s government ministers was that "piracy is a global problem that found headway in Somalia´s porous waters in recent years." One after another, they told me that Puntland isn´t tooled to combat this problem, because pirates are well-armed, well-financed and multi-jurisdictional. (That´s to say that pirates operate in places like Haradheere in central Somalia).

But surprisingly, and below the official line, there´s a wide belief among Puntlanders that "pirates [they don´t even use this word!] are heroes, because they are protecting Somalia´s unguarded resources, looted by international companies."

Quite the contrary, so many people, including former government officials and journalists told me that pirates have deep connections in the highest ranks in Puntland´s regime. In fact, people could list names of government ministers whose own militia are the pirates.

Few weeks ago, when pirates kidnapped a Japanese vessel outside Somalia´s international waters (which is quite routine, and, remarkably, counter-argument to those who say that pirates are "guarding" our resources), U.S. and French naval ships cornered the pirates near Boosaaso, the business capital of Puntland. The pirates, I was told, were able to disembark from the kidnapped ship every night to chew Khat and hang out with friends and family members, while other "substitute" pirates replaced them!

Eventually, the ordeal ended with the Japanese tanker being released unharmed, and pirates getting away with an undisclosed amount of ransom. The pirates´ front-men are senior government officials, who typically convince kidnapped ships to pay ransom (usually less then than pirates originally demanded). I found that this scenario occurred no less than three dozen times in the last few years.

n addition to piracy, human trafficking is pandemic in Puntland. More than 35,000 people have perished since 1991 trying to cross the short, but dangerous distance between Boosaaso and Yemen, using makeshift rafts.

Even back in the days when President Yusuf was the president of Puntland, the administration there made a noise that it will crack down on traffickers, whenever the international attention was zeroing on the issue.

However, hardly anything has been done. In fact, human traffickers, who like pirates have deep connections to the corridors of power, have flourished. In Boosaaso and nearby towns, journalists and other sources sent me the photos of the homes of well-known human traffickers and pirates, whose villas and latest-model Land Cruisers have dazzled me.

Last week, when Gwen Le Gouil, a French journalist tried to do an investigative report on human trafficking, he was kidnapped for nine grueling days. Remarkably, he was seized on his way to Shimbiraale, the infamous village known for its human and weapons traffickers. Insiders told me that his kidnappers were Puntland intelligence officers associated with both human traffickers and pirates.

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Taken from ethanzuckerman.com

Piracy has its origins in the organized communities of the Puntland coast.

In the 1990s, a group of fisherman in settlements there banded together to prevent illegal fishing and the dumping of toxic waste off their shores. This harmless community action inspired many analysts to designate Puntland a model for Somali civil society. When some ships illegally fishing were boarded in attempts to police the region, the reward offered for the boats return was enormous—amounts that were many times the monthly income of entire villages. Piracy took off as an attempt to gain income from this type of civic policing, and slowly grew to what Kaplan called the "innocence" of piracy. It wasn´t long before the pirates became more ambitious, using the fishing boats they captured to hunt larger prey. And with the money that came in, small fishing towns were transformed into pirate havens. As responsible organizers, pirates have invested some of their profits back into the franchise, replacing barely seaworthy rafts with speedboats, AK-47s with modern arms, and GPS tracking systems to boot. The East African Seafarers´ Assistance Programme says there were just 100 Somali pirates in action in 2005, but there are now well over 1,000.

Professor Michael Weinstein, a Somalia expert in the political science department at Purdue University, accurately notes this history of this, but attributes the spike in attacks to a collapse of authority in the Puntland regime, with an administration "honeycombed with officials with links to the pirates." But through reviewing all the reports on the ground, I see a different story—the piracy gangs are now fabulously wealthy and are enjoying a lifestyle beyond the wildest dreams of many people in East Africa that has given them what any rich businessman in a society enjoys—influence, protection, and power. Check out this report:

They live a high-profile life – driving luxury vehicles, using fancy mobiles and laptops, living in big, decorated houses, marrying beautiful women,´ says Dahir Salaad Musse, a businessman in the port town of Bosasso in the semi-autonomous northern region of Puntland… ´Pirates are the best customers I have because they don´t bother bargaining like the others—they buy expensive shirts, trousers and aftershave,´ says Mohamed Ali Yarow, who owns a menswear store in Garowe. ´Girls like to date pirates because they give them good money.´ Puntland officials, while trying to play down the popularity of the pirates, also admit that flashing the cash helps the gangs achieve acceptance.

Remarkably, hostages are treated well, with some pirates even setting up special kitchens onshore to cook western meals for their captives. Medical care available on the ship is not withheld to force the hand of parties that would pay a ransom. The Somali pirates are more businessmen that extortionists, and the strategy is paying dividends—according to a report by London-based think tank Chatham House, shipping companies have forked over US$30 million in ransoms to Somali pirates this year. Welcome to growth enterprise in the anarchic societies of the 21st century.

Analysts were right about Puntland´s organization, but they were wrong that Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, president of the transitional government and the former leader of Puntland, could spread the discipline of goverment and organization to elsewhere in Somalia. Instead, it´s become the parent of a business model that could be copied in other lawless regions of the world.

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Convoys and sea police may defend against raiders Pirates of Puntland

By Philippe Leymarie

This article brought a huge smile to my face… Some analysts write fearful tracts that the pirates have links with terrorists and extremists, that the chaos is a direct result of international neglect of Somalia, and try to link pirates to the islamist insurgency that control much of the south or the recent terrorist bombings in Somaliland. This is nonsense. The origins of Somali piracy are not found in the southern half of the country, where a "transitional government" is dueling the Union of Islamic Courts with the half-hearted assistance of the Ethiopian military. Somali piracy originates in Puntland, a self-declared autonomous region of Somalia at the horn, hailed for years by policymakers as a model of a stable Somali state. Piracy has its origins in the organized communities of the Puntland coast. In the 1990s, a group of fisherman in settlements there banded together to prevent illegal fishing and the dumping of toxic waste off their shores. This harmless community action inspired many analysts to designate Puntland a model for Somali civil society. When some ships illegally fishing were boarded in attempts to police the region, the reward offered for the boats return was enormous—amounts that were many times the monthly income of entire villages. Piracy took off as an attempt to gain income from this type of civic policing, and slowly grew to what Kaplan called the "innocence" of piracy. It wasn´t long before the pirates became more ambitious, using the fishing boats they captured to hunt larger prey. And with the money that came in, small fishing towns were transformed into pirate havens. As responsible organizers, pirates have invested some of their profits back into the franchise, replacing barely seaworthy rafts with speedboats, AK-47s with modern arms, and GPS tracking systems to boot. The East African Seafarers´ Assistance Programme says there were just 100 Somali pirates in action in 2005, but there are now well over 1,000.

John Mortell´s blog wrote that Somali Piracy is the Result of Civic Organisation? added these pithy words on Nov 22 08 at 5:02 pm

Hostile Takeovers or Good Corporate Governance? Somali piracy has been headline news over the past half year. In April, pirates off the coast of Somalia took control of Le Ponant, a French luxury yacht. In October, the Ukrainian cargo MV Faina was captured, which included in its hold 25 armormed tanks. And earlier this month, a tanker carrying oil up to $100 million in value was hijacked off the coast of Somalia. Shipping "war insurance"—covered previously at CA here—is becoming expensive, as ships such as the Sirius and Le Ponant, previously thought to be beyond the grasp of pirates, are now seen as vulnerable. The range of the Somali pirates is growing as well. Until just last month, ships were thought to be safe if they kept 200 nautical miles from Somalia, but the Sirius Star was 450 nautical miles from the coast when it was hijacked in a lightening 16 minute takeover. Read how another tanker captain avoided capture with S-manuevers and other unpredictable navigation here.

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Somalia: Puntland Soldiers Join Forces With Pirates - Mayor

5 June 2008 – Garoowe Online

Soldiers working with regional administration of Puntland, in Somalia's northeast, have reportedly joined forces with pirates, a local mayor told Radio Garowe.

Abdullahi Said O'Nur, the mayor of Puntland's coastal town of Eyl, said the security situation and the local economy have been adversely affected by the arrival of hundreds of soldiers.

The Mayor, who is currently in the Puntland capital of Garowe, told Radio Garowe during a Thursday interview that 400 soldiers backed by armored trucks had arrived in Eyl in recent days.

"I appeal to the ship's owners not to pay any ransom," Eyl Mayor O'Nur said, while addressing the fate of MV Amiya Scan, a Dutch-owned ship with a nine-member crew of Russians and Filipinos on board.

Earlier this week, Somali pirates who seized the MV Amiya Scan demanded a $1.1 million ransom payment, according to a Reuters report.

Independent sources in Eyl said all foreign crewpersons on board were in "good health," but concern lingered about the safety of the crew after pirates issued death threats if Puntland troops attempted to storm the ship.

Insiders linked the arrival of hundreds of Puntland soldiers in Eyl to Puntland President Adde Muse's recent declaration that the regional authority lacks the resources to pay for the services of its employees, including members of the security forces.

For the past five months, Puntland security forces have not received any pay. But informed sources said that some soldiers receive regular pay, including government leaders' armed guards, Puntland Intelligence Service (PIS) agents, and a private militia reportedly being funded by a Canadian company exploring for oil in Puntland.

Some reports indicated that the defecting soldiers left military barracks along Puntland's unofficial border with Somaliland, a breakaway Somali republic that has not been recognized internationally.

Critics have often accused the government of Puntland of neglecting its security forces, a development that has led to the worsening insecurity across the region.

Some ex-soldiers have turned to petty criminality, while others have joined Somali pirates, who have earned millions of dollars in ransom payments since the beginning of 2008.

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Puntland: The Epicenter of Somalia´s Piracy and Human Trafficking

From: Hiiraan.com

By: Said Shiiq, Ph.D.

Thursday, December 27, 2007

Some people blame the semi-autonomous region of Puntland for outsourcing President Abdullahi Yusuf to the national scene after he pitted sub-clans against each other, ditched the results of democratic presidential elections, and threatened the stability of the region.

But I disagree with that charge; Insofar as President Yusuf is being foisted to the national scene by tactful Ethiopian hands, he has always espoused an ambition to become Somalia´s president, irrespective of how he gets there.

That said, I think that Yusuf´s bastion, Puntland, is increasingly becoming a poster child for Somalia´s umpteen problems. Earlier this year, I tried to travel to Puntland to investigate the mysterious piracy and the tragic human trafficking business, both of which found a safe-haven in that part of the country.

Everyone I know warned me against entering Puntland´s ethnic territory. For that reason, I retreated to conduct a satellite research, using telephone conversations and first-person accounts, among others. What I found was rather baffling, to say the least.

Piracy in Puntland

Not surprisingly, the official line among Puntland´s government ministers was that "piracy is a global problem that found headway in Somalia´s porous waters in recent years." One after another, they told me that Puntland isn´t tooled to combat this problem, because pirates are well-armed, well-financed and multi-jurisdictional. (That´s to say that pirates operate in places like Haradheere in central Somalia).

But surprisingly, and below the official line, there´s a wide belief among Puntlanders that "pirates [they don´t even use this word!] are heroes, because they are protecting Somalia´s unguarded resources, looted by international companies."

Quite the contrary, so many people, including former government officials and journalists told me that pirates have deep connections in the highest ranks in Puntland´s regime. In fact, people could list names of government ministers whose own militia are the pirates.

Few weeks ago, when pirates kidnapped a Japanese vessel outside Somalia´s international waters (which is quite routine, and, remarkably, counter-argument to those who say that pirates are "guarding" our resources), U.S. and French naval ships cornered the pirates near Boosaaso, the business capital of Puntland. The pirates, I was told, were able to disembark from the kidnapped ship every night to chew Khat and hang out with friends and family members, while other "substitute" pirates replaced them!

Eventually, the ordeal ended with the Japanese tanker being released unharmed, and pirates getting away with an undisclosed amount of ransom. The pirates´ front-men are senior government officials, who typically convince kidnapped ships to pay ransom (usually less then than pirates originally demanded). I found that this scenario occurred no less than three dozen times in the last few years.

It´s technically true, I also found, that pirates are "multi-jurisdictional." But sources confirmed to me that Haradheere-based gangs are no more than "holders" of the ships seized by Puntland pirates, whenever there´s an internal dispute among Puntland ring leaders. As such, only two or three times have pirates actually "held" a ship in Haradheere for the real pirates.

Human Trafficking

In addition to piracy, human trafficking is pandemic in Puntland. More than 35,000 people have perished since 1991 trying to cross the short, but dangerous distance between Boosaaso and Yemen, using makeshift rafts.

Even back in the days when President Yusuf was the president of Puntland, the administration there made a noise that it will crack down on traffickers, whenever the international attention was zeroing on the issue.

However, hardly anything has been done. In fact, human traffickers, who like pirates have deep connections to the corridors of power, have flourished. In Boosaaso and nearby towns, journalists and other sources sent me the photos of the homes of well-known human traffickers and pirates, whose villas and latest-model Land Cruisers have dazzled me.

Last week, when Gwen Le Gouil, a French journalist tried to do an investigative report on human trafficking, he was kidnapped for nine grueling days. Remarkably, he was seized on his way to Shimbiraale, the infamous village known for its human and weapons traffickers. Insiders told me that his kidnappers were Puntland intelligence officers associated with both human traffickers and pirates.

Here´s the evidence to back that claim:

First, a day after Mr. Le Gouil was kidnapped his captors took his photos, brandishing their AK47´s behind him. The digital photos were distributed to Somali media outlets, to maximize the damage and instill fear on foreign journalists trying to get to the bottom of this murky business. Now, who would believe that everyday kidnappers carry digital cameras and presumably a laptop with them?

I, for one, don´t buy it.

Secondly, instead of handing this as a security issue, the Puntland administration delegated "elders" to the scene. Again, these are "front-men" for the human traffickers, who wouldn´t want their stories to be broadcast globally. The "elders" came back with a rather fascinating verdict: They held an impromptu press conference, in which they told foreign agencies that the French embassy in Nairobi has to compensate the kidnappers before Mr. Le Gouil could be released unharmed.

Left with no options, a diplomat from the French embassy in Kenya precipitously flew to Boosaaso to finalize that unholy deal. God knows how much the kidnappers pocketed, but Le Gouil was released on Christmas Day.

Charge the victim!

If you think that was the end of Mr. Le Gouil´s ordeal, you´re terribly wrong. The Puntland administration actually announced that they "will prosecute Le Gouil for illegally entering [our] sovereign nation!"

This official threat forced the French government to hastily agree to pay an undisclosed ransom to the kidnappers. Furthermore, with the admission of President Adde Musse Hirsi, the kidnappers, driving a Land Cruiser, dropped Mr. Le Gouil at a major hotel in downtown Boosaaso. Conveniently, one Puntland minister told the VOA Somali Service that Mr. Le Gouil was "pardoned for entering the country illegally."

Also speaking to the VOA Somali Service on Wednesday, President Adde Musse admitted that none of the kidnappers was arrested, let alone be charged. Instead, he unleashed a barrage of attacks against "Puntland enemies" for perpetrating all these problems. Pressed for more reasonable answers, he retreated and blamed his former ally and former Minister of Fisheries, Said Mohamed Raage, for "some of the problems."

Sadly, President Hirsi didn´t elaborate on whether Mr. Raage is a former minister-pirate-trafficker.

On this same day, two MSF humanitarian workers were again abducted in plain sight and in the middle of Boosaaso. Adde Musse, at it again, said this time the security apparatus would handle the case. The kidnappers, at it again, took the victims to Shimbiraale, the same location they took Mr. Le Gouil, according to media accounts.

So which one would you believe? Some say the two aren´t mutually exclusive!

Adding an insult to the injury, the apocalyptic Transitional Federal Government revoked MSF Belgium´s license to operate in Somalia on the same day when two of its foreign employees were kidnapped. I didn´t know that the TFG could "revoke" a license, per se, but I can draw my own conclusions about the interesting coincidence.

Once again, the TFG is inseparable from Puntland, and the two operate in an often conspicuous fashion. But that´s beside the point. Puntland, for all practical purposes, is translating its relatively stable ethnic enclave to either attack its not-so-ethnic neighbor, Somaliland, or to groom pirates and human traffickers.

That´s on top of claiming an extraordinary power to unilaterally exploiting oil and other national resources at the expense of the nation. One wonders: Is Puntland flying solo to the point of no return?