Perils on the sea

As leaders of the NATO military alliance head for a summit at which new measures against shipborne terrorism will be on the agenda, there are worries that world trade may be disrupted by new anti-terror rules for ports and ships that are about to come into force

A QUARTER of the world’s entire maritime trade,

including about half of all seaborne oil shipments, passes through the Malacca strait in South-East Asia, which at one point narrows to as little as one and a half nautical miles. The strait and the seas around it are infested with well-organised, armed and ruthless pirates (see map) who hijack ships and kill or maroon their crews before repainting the vessels at sea and sailing into port under a new, “phantom” identity. If pirates can do this so easily, why not terrorists? Imagine the devastation to world trade if one or more giant tankers were captured and used to block the straits. Or the possible casualties if a hijacked phantom ship were used to carry a nuclear “dirty bomb” into one of the world’s main ports or to launch missiles at a coastal city?

These are nightmare scenarios worthy of a Hollywood disaster movie. But they are also the sort of threats that are being taken seriously by the world’s governments. On Monday June 28th, leaders of the NATO military alliance will begin a summit in Istanbul, Turkey, which will discuss a package of measures against terrorism, including seaborne threats. (To guard against just such threats, the nearby Bosphorus strait, another busy shipping route, will be closed to hazardous cargoes during the summit.) Three days later, new international security regulations for ships and ports will come into force, along with measures under America’s new Maritime Transportation Security Act.

The new measures specify what security equipment each ship and port must have, and oblige them to draw up and enact adequate security plans, and to designate officers to ensure these are complied with. But while the new rules are intended to prevent serious disruption to world trade due to terrorist attacks, in the short term they risk causing exactly such disruption: many ports and shipping lines are still not up to the new security standards and thus, if America and other countries impose them strictly from day one, many ships may be arrested or denied entry to ports.

The United States Coast Guard says it intends to board every ship that does not comply with the rules on its first entry to an American port from July 1st. This will be quite some task, given that there are 60,000 calls at American ports each year by ocean-going ships. Nevertheless, the American authorities are confident that this will not cause serious hold-ups to trade (especially in oil, given the current worries about maintaining supplies).

However, those elsewhere are not so confident. Christoph Brockmann, an official of Germany’s main maritime agency, told Reuters news agency this week that, if European Union countries insisted on strict compliance, there would be disruption to trade. Mr Brockmann said only 60% of the roughly 200 ships that call at German ports each day have the International Ship Security Certificate that will be compulsory from July 1st. The US Coast Guard said that, by last week, only 57% of foreign-flagged ships entering American ports were in compliance with the new international and American regulations, though the numbers were rising quickly.

The world’s ports may be even less prepared than its shipping lines come July 1st: on Monday the International Maritime Organisation (IMO), which drew up the new International Ship and Port Facility Security Code, said that only 16% of ports in 39 countries that responded to its inquiries had the officially approved security plans that the code requires.

Maritime terrorism is not a new phenomenon. In 1985, Palestinian terrorists hijacked an Italian cruise liner, the Achille Lauro. A passenger was killed during the ensuing hostage crisis. Muslim militants in Yemen blew a hole in an American warship, the USS Cole, in 2000, and another in a French oil tanker, the Limburg, in 2002. Abu Sayyaf, a terrorist outfit from the Philippines, bombed a ferry in Manila Bay earlier this year. Singapore’s authorities recently said terrorist suspects arrested by them had confessed to planning an attack on visiting American ships. And they are worried about a puzzling hijack last year, when supposed pirates seized a chemical tanker in the Malacca strait only to abandon ship after an hour. A dry run for a future floating-bomb attack?

With NATO’s credibility undermined by its member countries’ differences over Iraq and their failure to provide adequate troops to pacify Afghanistan, the alliance’s leaders will be keen to demonstrate that NATO still has a valuable role to play in the 21st century. The co-ordination of international anti-terrorism efforts should be part of that role. Hence the package of measures to be discussed at the summit, which includes protecting ports and shipping from surface and sub-surface terrorist threats.

NATO has already begun joint anti-terrorism naval patrols in the Mediterranean Sea including the boarding of suspect vessels and escorting vulnerable shipping through the Gibraltar straits. On Thursday, the alliance’s secretary-general, Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, said Russia and Ukraine will be invited to join these patrols. NATO wants to extend them to the Black Sea, which is at risk from terror groups from the Caucasus, Central Asia and elsewhere.

America is also pressing other countries to sign up to its container-security initiative, launched four months after the September 11th 2001 attacks. Under this scheme, containers bound for America are screened in their port of departure. On Friday, Greece is due to become the 18th country to sign up, ahead of this summer’s Olympic games. American security officials will be deployed in Greece’s main port, Piraeus, to help identify and check suspect containers.

America and its allies are also urging countries adjacent to vulnerable shipping lanes, especially the Malacca strait, to step up their patrols. Next week, the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) will discuss Indonesia’s proposals to form a NATO-style security community, which among other things would increase co-operation on maritime patrols. However, relations between many of the region’s governments are prickly and it will not be easy to persuade them to work together. Furthermore, Indonesia itself has faced much criticism for failing to give its navy and coastguard the resources to police adequately its side of the Malacca strait. Rankled by such criticism, the Indonesian navy’s chief of staff promised earlier this month to introduce a shoot-to-kill policy against pirates and terrorists in its waters.

Since almost all of China’s oil imports go through the Malacca strait, it might be expected to show some willingness to help finance better patrolling of the waterway. But so far it has proved reluctant to do so, claiming it cannot afford to. Adequate patrolling of the world’s most vulnerable shipping lanes would indeed be costly. The new security requirements being imposed on ports and shipping lines are also proving expensive, which is why so many are dragging their feet on complying with them. But the cost of a terrorist attack that succeeds in disrupting world trade—especially in oil—could be colossal.

http://www.iccwbo.org/ccs/imb_piracy/weekly_piracy_report.asp

Weekly Piracy Report

15 - 21 June 2004.

The following is a summary of the daily reports broadcast by the IMB's Piracy Reporting Centre to ships in Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Ocean Regions on the SafetyNET service of Inmarsat-C from 15 - 21 June 2004.

Warning

Vicinity of the coast of north Sumatra / Aceh, northern Malacca straits.
Six violent and serious attacks were reported in the past three weeks. Group(s) of pirates with automatic guns are targeting vessels even during daylight hours. Ships are advised to take extra precautions.

Suspicious craft

15.06.2004 at 1200 UTC in posn 06:15.06N - 092:11.6E, Indian Ocean.
A suspicious craft approached a tanker underway. Crew activated fire hoses, directed searchlights and took evasive manoeuvres. Craft stopped following and fled.

Actual or attempted attacks

	19.06.2004 at 2300 LT in posn 03:12.46S - 116:19.41E, Pemancingan anchorage, Kalimantan, Indonesia. Seven robbers armed with long knives boarded a bulk carrier at forecastle. They overpowered three crewmembers and broke into forward lockers. They stole ship's stores, jumped overboard, and escaped in a waiting speedboat.
	19.06.2004 at 0615 LT in posn 14:41.24N - 017:23.36W, Dakar anchorage, Senegal. Three robbers armed with long knives boarded a bulk carrier. They held duty A/B as hostage and stole ship's stores. Alert crew raised alarm and robbers jumped into water and escaped. Port control informed.
	16.06.2004 at 0200 LT at north Pulau Laut anchorage, Indonesia. Five robbers armed with knives, daggers and crowbars boarded a bulk carrier via hawse pipe. They tied up duty A/B and escaped with ship's stores.
	15.06.2004 at 1200 UTC in posn 05:28N - 098:34E, Malacca straits. Pirates in three boats attempted to attack a RORO ship underway. Alert crew raised alarm, activated fire hoses, directed searchlights and took evasive manoeuvres. Pirates aborted attempt and fled.
	15.06.2004 during night hours at Puerto Plata port, Dominican Republic. Six robbers armed with long knives boarded a bulk carrier at forecastle. Alert crew raised alarm, secured accommodation doors and chased robbers. Who jumped into water and escaped.
	14.06.2004 at 0130 LT about 10 nm off Kuala Sepetang fishing village, Malaysia. About ten persons armed with automatic weapons boarded a fishing trawler and abducted three crewmembers. Three other released fishermen lodged a police report.
	14.06.2004 at 0405 LT in posn 01:15.87S - 116:47.69E, Balikpapan inner anchorage, Indonesia. Two robbers in a speedboat boarded a bulk carrier via anchor chain. Anti-piracy crew raised alarm and robbers escaped empty handed.
	13.06.2004 at 1800 LT in posn 05:03N - 098:45E, Malacca straits. Pirates armed with guns in eight small boats fired upon a tug towing a barge. They ordered the tug to stop under threat of continuing gunfire. Tug stopped and seven armed pirates boarded. They stole cash, crew personal belongings, ship's documents and kidnapped master and C/E. They threatened C/O not to alert the authorities for 5 days or master and C/E would be killed.
	13.06.2004 at 0540 LT at Douala port, Cameroon. Two robbers boarded a general cargo ship at stern using ropes. Duty crew raised alarm. Robbers were unable to enter accommodation as all doors were secured. Alert crew chased robbers and they jumped into the water and escaped. At the same time another three robbers armed with knives boarded from the gangway and threatened duty watchman.

Piracy prone areas and warnings

S E Asia and the Indian Sub Continent

Bangladesh: Chittagong at berth and anchorage. Theft of zinc anodes welded to ship's sides and stern.

India: Chennai, Cochin, Haldia

Indonesia: Adang Bay, Anambas/Natuna Island, Balikpapan, Belawan, Dumai, Gaspar/Bar/Leplia Str, Jakarta (Tg.Priok), Lawi-Lawi, Pulau Laut, Samarinda, Vicinity of Bintan Island

Malacca straits: avoid anchoring along the Indonesian coast of the straits. Coast near Aceh is particularly risky for hijackings.

Philippines: Manila

Singapore Straits

Vietnam: Haipong, Ho Chi Minh City, Vung Tau

Africa and Red Sea

Gulf of Aden

Somalian Waters - eastern and northeastern coasts have been high-risk areas for hijackings. Whilst there have been no recent incidents, ships not making scheduled calls to ports in these areas should stay away from the coast.

East Africa: Dar Es Salaam

West Africa: Abidjan, Conakry, Dakar, Douala, Lagos, Luanda, Onne, Tema, Warri

South and Central America and the Caribbean waters

Brazil - Belem, Santos
Colombia - Barranquilla, Buena Ventura
Dominican republic - Rio Haina
Guyana - Georgetown
Jamaica - Kingston
Peru - Callao
Venezuela - Guanta, Puerto Cabello, Sucre

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