East Asian governments
must clamp down on piracy together
London,
20 March 2000 - As
hijackings of ships in east Asian waters continue unchecked, co-ordinated action
by governments is urgently needed if the region's crowded sea lanes are to be
made safe for seafarers.
There are signs that this
is beginning to happen. Japan has called a conference of Asian governments in
Tokyo at the end of March with the aim of improving counter measures and regional
anti-piracy co-operation.
Governments that have not
yet done so are being urged to ratify the International Maritime Organisation's
(IMO) 1988 Rome Convention on the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against the Safety
of Maritime Navigation. Ratification will make it easier for the governments
to prosecute pirates.
Modern piracy is violent,
bloody and ruthless. It is all the more fearsome because almost invariably its
victims are defenceless and far from the protection of the law.
There is evidence that organised
crime is behind some of the bands of marauders that prey on shipping in the
coastal waters of Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and other countries.
More than two thirds of
the attacks reported to the International Maritime Bureau, a division of the
International Chamber of Commerce, are in Asian waters. Reported incidents have
tripled since the early 1990s. In 1999, the IMB's Piracy Reporting Centre in
Kuala Lumpur tracked 285 piratical attacks - an increase of more than 40% on
the previous year. Most were little more than muggings at sea, with robbery
the motive.
Hijackings are comparatively
rare. They require a degree of organisation that only the international crime
syndicates can muster. But at all levels, extreme violence or the threat of
it is frequent.
Only last month, the Japanese-owned
Global Mars was boarded by an armed gang in the mouth of the Malacca Straits,
one of the world's most congested sea ways plied by 30,000 vessels every year.
With typical callousness, the pirates tied up and blindfolded the crew and kept
them prisoners for 11 days before finally setting them adrift in an open boat
with only a little food and water.
The Panamanian-registered
ship and its cargo of palm oil has disappeared, so far without trace. The 17
crew members from South Korea and Myanmar were rescued by
a Thai fishing boat
after five days adrift.
The Piracy Reporting Centre
put out a detailed description of the missing ship in its daily report beamed
by satellite to all shipping. Last year, the centre played a pivotal role in
tracking down another Japanese-owned ship, the Alondra Rainbow, which was hijacked
in Indonesian waters and arrested by the Indian coastguard off Goa.
The Global Mars has probably
been given a new name and repainted. Armed with false registration papers and
bills of lading, the pirates - or more likely the mafia bosses pulling the strings
- will then try to dispose of their booty. The vessel has probably put in to
a port where the false identity of vessel and cargo may escape detection. Even
when identified, the gangs have been known to bribe local officials to allow
them to sell the cargo and leave the port.
Wherever their destination,
it is less likely these days to be in China since the Chinese authorities have
started to crack down on pirates. China handed down death sentences last year
on the 13 hijackers of the Cheung Son, one of the most brutal recent cases of
piracy, in which 23 Chinese seamen were murdered.
Pirates are now going further
afield to dispose of hijacked ships and cargoes, with India and Iran favoured
destinations.
What makes piracy a tempting
crime is the difficulty of effective law enforcement, and the unwillingness
of many countries to prosecute pirates caught in their own territorial waters
for acts of piracy committed under another country's jurisdiction.
This is where the Rome
convention comes in. It seeks to remove the problem of jurisdiction in piracy
cases, which has all too often prevented states from prosecuting pirates that
enter their territorial waters after committing piracy in the jurisdiction of
another country.
India, where the convention
came into force on 15 January, says it intends to try the pirates who seized
the Alondra Rainbow. So far, only 43 countries have ratified the convention
and in East Asia, only China, Japan and Australia have done so. All the ASEAN
states plus Korea and China and Japan are taking part in the Tokyo conference,
called at the initiative of Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi.
Pirates must be made aware
that the hands of all men are against them. That will only happen if the IMO
convention is ratified and enacted by all countries. Pirates will then be unable
to seek sanctuary in countries that have yet to arm their courts with powers
to prosecute.
Piracy has been the enemy
of commerce for centuries. The International Chamber of Commerce, representing
world business, is giving the fullest backing to the Tokyo conference and its
aims.