Abandoned Headlines: Piracy Coverage Missing the Point

Looking for the "Why?" in the Equation

The coverage of Somali piracy took a turn from deficient to laughable this morning, gracing us with headlines like Kill the Pirates (Washington Post), Real Men Invade Somalia, and Saving Captain Phillips (WSJ). I can just see it now: Saving Captain Phillips, coming to a theater near you!

None of these articles, or the ones preceding them, have cared to examine the root causes of this bane to international maritime security. Some might say that’s because it simply isn’t pertinent, but I’d argue it’s because it isn’t convenient. I would also argue it’s more important as a long-term approach to examine piracy’s root causes rather than how to deal with it in a military capacity. Cut off a hydra’s tentacles and they’ll grow back. Striking at the body is the only way to eliminate it.

Watching Meet the Press on Sunday morning, I was perturbed by the paucity of insight during a discussion on the topic. It wasn't a misunderstanding of root causes so much as a complete indifference to them.

What about the damage done to the Somali fisherman, whose entire livelihood has been, eradicated by fishing trawlers that recklessly destabilize and loot their seas? The pirates would argue they are merely protecting their shores from the poaching of international fishing fleets. Who then are the real pirates? This Chicago Tribune article from 2008 offered a uniquely fresh perspective:

“Somalia's lawless coastline has been ravaged by unscrupulous outsiders with impunity since the Somali government collapsed in 1991…

Somalia, like all maritime countries, has legal rights over an exclusive economic zone that extends 200 nautical miles to sea. And though it has no navy to enforce its control, it theoretically owns the fish and minerals in that area…

Many of Somalia's angry fishermen have picked up rifles and joined the pirate mafias that have seized more than two dozen vessels off the Somali coast so far this year (Oct. 2008) …”

And let’s not forget about the vast amounts of toxic waste, some of it nuclear, dumped off the Somali coast by Western corporations. Apparently, this is being done without the authority of the West's governments. This still beckons the question: where are the calls for stringent enforcement of maritime law then?

A UN Environmental Program official explained to Al-Jazeera back in 2008:

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

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

"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."

Johann Hari of the Huffington Post lucidly delves into the mindset of the typical Somali, 70% of whom support the pirates, something most media outlets haven’t bothered to understand:

“Did we expect starving (Somalis) to stand passively on their beaches, paddling in our nuclear waste, and watch us snatch their fish to eat in restaurants in London and Paris and Rome? We didn’t act on those crimes - but when some of the fishermen responded by disrupting the transit-corridor for 20 percent of the world’s oil supply, we begin to shriek about “evil.” If we really want to deal with piracy, we need to stop its root cause - our crimes - before we send in the gun-boats to root out Somalia’s criminals.”

Nonetheless, we must avoid romanticizing the pirates as modern-day Robin Hoods. Their crimes have been heinous, especially the hijacking of World Food Program (WFP) vessels on which most Somalis depend for food. Indeed, there is a contingent that has been left no alternative for feeding their families. Many pirates however, are seeking ransoms to finance the warlords and militias ashore, which operate with impunity in a land of anarchy.

Sunday morning I read an op-ed in the Times, the title of which was Anarchy on Land Means Piracy at Sea. I liked where the article was going at first, but it ultimately teetered off into the typical concerns-about-terrorism diatribe that has been the predominant thesis of piracy coverage. It's disappointing that the Times elected to ignore America’s role in perpetuating the anarchy.

In 2006, the United States supported an Ethiopian invasion of Somalia, undermining the Islamic Court Union (ICU). The ICU, an Islamist force that had restored a semblance of order to a nation utterly deprived of it since 1991, had been construed as a jihadist enterprise by the Bush Administration, making their fall predetermined.

With the ICU now severely weakened, the new ruling power in Somalia (on paper at least) is holding on for dear life as it contends with Al-Shabaab, an Islamist organization far more militant than the ICU, who considers Osama bin Laden to be their spiritual father. It is this group, among others, that the West fears is benefitting from piracy.

Check out this fascinating video below about the unresolved murder of Italian journalists attempting to disclose arms smuggling and toxic waste dumping by an Italian corporation in Somalia: