MOGADISHU, Somalia (Nov. 18)

Pirates who seized a Saudi supertanker loaded with $100 million in crude oil anchored the ship within sight of impoverished Somali fishing villages Tuesday, while the U.S. and other naval forces decided against intervention for now.

With few other options, shipowners in past piracy cases have ended up paying ransoms for their ships, cargos and crew.

It is the farthest from shore Somali pirates have struck and is thought to be the largest ship ever hijacked. The aircraft-carrier-sized tanker, owned by Saudi oil company Aramco, was carrying crude oil. It can carry about 2 million barrels.

NATO said it would not divert any of its three warships from the Gulf of Aden and the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet also said it did not expect to send ships to try to intercept the MV Sirius Star. The tanker was seized over the weekend about 450 nautical miles off the Kenyan coast, the latest in a surge of pirate attacks this year.

Never before have Somali pirates seized such a giant ship so far out to sea — and never a vessel so large. The captors of the Sirius Star anchored the ship, with a full load of 2 million barrels of oil and 25 crew members, close to a main pirate den on the Somali coast, Harardhere.
Somalis on shore were stunned by the gigantic vessel — as long as an aircraft carrier at 1,080 feet (329 meters).

"As usual, I woke up at 3 a.m. and headed for the sea to fish, but I saw a very, very large ship anchored less than three miles off the shore," said Abdinur Haji, a fisherman in Harardhere.

"I have been fishing here for three decades, but I have never seen a ship as big as this one," he told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. "There are dozens of spectators on shore trying to catch a glimpse of the large ship, which they can see with their naked eyes."

He said two small boats floated out to the ship and 18 men — presumably other pirates — climbed aboard with a rope ladder. Spectators watched as a small boat carried food and qat, a narcotic leaf popular in Somalia, to the supertanker.

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal called the hijacking "an outrageous act" and said "piracy, like terrorism, is a disease which is against everybody, and everybody must address it together."

Speaking during a visit to Athens on Tuesday, he said Saudi Arabia would join an international initiative against piracy in the Red Sea area, where more than 80 pirate attacks have taken place this year.
He did not elaborate on what steps the kingdom would take to better protect its vital oil tankers. Saudi Arabia's French-equipped navy has 18,000-20,000 personnel, but has never taken part in any high-seas fighting.
Abdullkadir Musa, the deputy sea port minister in northern Somalia's breakaway Puntland region, said if the ship tries to anchor anywhere near Eyl — where the U.S. said it was heading — then his forces will try to rescue it.

Forces from Puntland have confronted pirates off the coast, though Somalia's weak central government, which is fighting Islamic insurgents, has been unable to mount a response to increasing piracy.
Puntland forces, their guns blazing, freed a Panama-flagged cargo ship from pirates on Oct. 14. The gunbattle killed one soldier and injured three others. No hostages or pirates were hurt.

The Dubai-based owner of the Saudi tanker Vela International Marine Ltd. said the oil tanker's crew "are believed to be safe." The crew consists of 19 Philippines nationals, two British, two Polish, one Croatian and one Saudi national.

The statement made no mention of a ransom or contacts with the bandits, but such companies have little choice but to pay out huge ransoms, usually totaling around $1 million, to ensure the safety of the crew and the vessel's return.

The Sirius Star's cargo is worth about $100 million at current prices, but the pirates have no known way to unload it from the tanker and there are no oil refineries in Somalia.

In Vienna, Ehsan Ul-Haq, chief analyst at JBC Energy, said the seizure was not affecting oil prices, since traders are focused instead on "the overall economy."

The latest in a surge of pirate hijackings highlighted the vulnerability of even very large ships and the inability of naval forces to intervene once bandits are on board.

The U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet said Tuesday it was monitoring the situation but didn't expect to send warships to surround the vessel as it has done with a Ukrainian ship loaded with tanks and other weaponry seized Sept. 25 off the Somali coast. That ship remains in pirate hands but the U.S. is making sure those weapons are not taken off the ship.

In Somalia, pirates are better-funded, better-organized and better-armed than one might imagine in a country that has been in tatters for nearly two decades. They have the support of their communities and rogue members of the government — some pirates even promise to put ransom money toward building roads and schools.

Often dressed in military fatigues, pirates travel in open skiffs with outboard engines, working with larger ships that tow them far out to sea. They use satellite navigational and communications equipment and an intimate knowledge of local waters, clambering aboard commercial vessels with ladders and grappling hooks.
They are typically armed with automatic weapons, anti-tank rocket launchers and grenades — weaponry that is readily available throughout Somalia.

Surk contributed to this report from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. AP writers Mohamed Olad Hassan in Mogadishu, Somalia, and Slobodan Lekic in Brussels, Belgium contributed to this report.

I am going to show my ignorance here folks. This is the second huge ship attacked by pirates in the last few weeks. Another ship loaded with tanks and guns and ammunition is still being held captive by these Somalian pirates and has been "surrounded" by ships from various Navy groups to prevent the weapons from being off-loaded.

Why don't ships sailing through Somalian waters post lookouts all over their decks and if any small boat/
raft approaches their ship just shoot them out of the water?! I just don't understand how this can happen. Perhaps one of you can give me a different perspective on this.

This would be down to the owners to put an armed security onboard to fight. The crew are seaman & from various countries they hide when boarded just not paid to fight!
Merchantmen radar is not suited to detecting the small boats which rush in at full speed to board, normally over the stern & the amount of lookouts required to cover the area around the ship would be many seeing the speed of the pirates boats.
Normally the first anyone knows of the boarding is when the pirates appear on the bridge.
Back in the early sixties Britain had Fast Patrol Boats these in waters to prevent smuggling, mainly weapons & the craft used by the smugglers could out run a FPB.
I was on board a Radar Picket Destroyer, my first ship, & we spent three months coordinating the screen.

Thanks for the informative explanation Kipper.

All the pictures I've seen lately show the pirates in rubber dinghys with outboard motors. I didn't realize they had sophisticated boats.

One would think that the owners would ensure they had security on their vessels though. The pirates are asking for 20 million dollars ransom for the ship loaded with tanks and guns. They could have easily put security with guns on board knowing they are sailing through Somalian waters for a small per centage of what they might have to pay.

Too bad the radar isn't sufficient enough to show the small vessels long before they have a chance to get to the big ship.

I would possibly suspect that there would be problems with Armed Personal on Merchant ships!
When travelling through national waters & docking at ports, somewhere there must be ports in countries who would not look favourable on an armed merchant ship in their waters.
Most attacks come in the Gulf of Aden, where we patrolled all those years ago, I would have thought that convoy tactics & escorts could help. But again territorial waters are guarded jealously!
Shipping is a competitive market if you add the cost of guards the customer will always find a cheaper shipping company with cheap labour, flag of convenience willing to take the risk!

To add look at the pirates around the Malaca & the Singapore Straits, a very busy water way well patrolled but here the so called pirates only rob the crew & what ever else can be found, the cargo & ship are left intact. Here they are just common thieves as opposed to the gangsters of Somalia demanding money with threats.

Here an article I found recently on Aljazeera. It definitely doesn't justify piracy, nor do I believe that this is the real reason for their actions, but I suspect some truth in it - unfortunately.

'Toxic waste' behind Somali piracy
By Najad Abdullahi

Some pirates operating off Somalia's coast claim to act as coastguards [GALLO/GETTY]

Somali pirates have accused European firms of dumping toxic waste off the Somali coast and are demanding an $8m ransom for the return of a Ukranian ship they captured, saying the money will go towards cleaning up the waste.

The ransom demand is a means of "reacting to the toxic waste that has been continually dumped on the shores of our country for nearly 20 years", Januna Ali Jama, a spokesman for the pirates, based in the semi-autonomous region of Puntland, said.

"The Somali coastline has been destroyed, and we believe this money is nothing compared to the devastation that we have seen on the seas."

The pirates are holding the MV Faina, a Ukrainian ship carrying tanks and military hardware, off Somalia's northern coast.

According to the International Maritime Bureau, 61 attacks by pirates have been reported since the start of the year.

While money is the primary objective of the hijackings, claims of the continued environmental destruction off Somalia's coast have been largely ignored by the regions's maritime authorities.

Dumping allegations

Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the UN envoy for Somalia confirmed to Al Jazeera the world body has "reliable information" that European and Asian companies are dumping toxic waste, including nuclear waste, off the Somali coastline.

"I must stress however, that no government has endorsed this act, and that private companies and individuals acting alone are responsible," he said

Allegations of the dumping of toxic waste, as well as illegal fishing, have circulated since the early 1990s.
But evidence of such practices literally appeared on the beaches of northern Somalia when the tsunami of 2004 hit the country.

The UN Environment Programme (UNEP) reported the tsunami had washed up rusting containers of toxic waste on the shores of Puntland.

Nick Nuttall, a UNEP spokesman, told Al Jazeera that when the barrels were smashed open by the force of the waves, the containers exposed a "frightening activity" that has been going on for more than decade.

"Somalia has been used as a dumping ground for hazardous waste starting in the early 1990s, and continuing through the civil war there," he said.

"European companies found it to be very cheap to get rid of the waste, costing as little as $2.50 a tonne, where waste disposal costs in Europe are something like $1000 a tonne.

"And the waste is many different kinds. There is uranium radioactive waste. There is lead, and heavy metals like cadmium and mercury. There is also industrial waste, and there are hospital wastes, chemical wastes – you name it."

Nuttall also said that since the containers came ashore, hundreds of residents have fallen ill, suffering from mouth and abdominal bleeding, skin infections and other ailments.

"We [the UNEP] had planned to do a proper, in-depth scientific assessment on the magnitude of the problem. But because of the high levels of insecurity onshore and off the Somali coast, we are unable to carry out an accurate assessment of the extent of the problem," he said.

However, Ould-Abdallah claims the practice still continues.

"What is most alarming here is that nuclear waste is being dumped. Radioactive uranium waste that is potentially killing Somalis and completely destroying the ocean," he said.

Toxic waste

Ould-Abdallah declined to name which companies are involved in waste dumping, citing legal reasons.

But he did say the practice helps fuel the 18-year-old civil war in Somalia as companies are paying Somali government ministers to dump their waste, or to secure licences and contracts.

"There is no government control ... and there are few people with high moral ground ... [and] yes, people in high positions are being paid off, but because of the fragility of the TFG [Transitional Federal Government], some of these companies now no longer ask the authorities – they simply dump their waste and leave."

Ould-Abdallah said there are ethical questions to be considered because the companies are negotiating contracts with a government that is largely divided along tribal lines.

"How can you negotiate these dealings with a country at war and with a government struggling to remain relevant?"

In 1992, a contract to secure the dumping of toxic waste was made by Swiss and Italian shipping firms Achair Partners and Progresso, with Nur Elmi Osman, a former official appointed to the government of Ali Mahdi Mohamed, one of many militia leaders involved in the ousting of Mohamed Siad Barre, Somalia's former president.

At the request of the Swiss and Italian governments, UNEP investigated the matter.

Both firms had denied entering into any agreement with militia leaders at the beginning of the Somali civil war.

Osman also denied signing any contract.

'Mafia involvement'

However, Mustafa Tolba, the former UNEP executive director, told Al Jazeera that he discovered the firms were set up as fictitious companies by larger industrial firms to dispose of hazardous waste.

"At the time, it felt like we were dealing with the Mafia, or some sort of organised crime group, possibly working with these industrial firms," he said.

"It was very shady, and quite underground, and I would agree with Ould-Abdallah’s claims that it is still going on... Unfortunately the war has not allowed environmental groups to investigate this fully."
The Italian mafia controls an estimated 30 per cent of Italy's waste disposal companies, including those that deal with toxic waste.

In 1998, Famiglia Cristiana, an Italian weekly magazine, claimed that although most of the waste-dumping took place after the start of the civil war in 1991, the activity actually began as early as 1989 under the Barre government.

Beyond the ethical question of trying to secure a hazardous waste agreement in an unstable country like Somalia, the alleged attempt by Swiss and Italian firms to dump waste in Somalia would violate international treaties to which both countries are signatories.

Legal ramifications

Switzerland and Italy signed and ratified the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal, which came into force in 1992.

EU member states, as well as 168 other countries have also signed the agreement.

The convention prohibits waste trade between countries that have signed the convention, as well as countries that have not signed the accord unless a bilateral agreement had been negotiated.

It is also prohibits the shipping of hazardous waste to a war zone.

Abdi Ismail Samatar, professor of Geography at the University of Minnesota, told Al Jazeera that because an international coalition of warships has been deployed to the Gulf of Aden, the alleged dumping of waste must have been observed.

Environmental damage

"If these acts are continuing, then surely they must have been seen by someone involved in maritime operations," he said.

"Is the cargo aimed at a certain destination more important than monitoring illegal activities in the region? Piracy is not the only problem for Somalia, and I think it's irresponsible on the part of the authorities to overlook this issue."

Mohammed Gure, chairman of the Somalia Concern Group, said that the social and environmental consequences will be felt for decades.

"The Somali coastline used to sustain hundreds of thousands of people, as a source of food and livelihoods. Now much of it is almost destroyed, primarily at the hands of these so-called ministers that have sold their nation to fill their own pockets."

Ould-Abdallah said piracy will not prevent waste dumping.

"The intentions of these pirates are not concerned with protecting their environment," he said.

"What is ultimately needed is a functioning, effective government that will get its act together and take control of its affairs."