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Tim Sonnreich. The threat of terrorists slamming airliners into buildings not freaking you out like it used to? Well here's something new to stress about - maritime terrorism, a.k.a. PIRACY (and not the "ahoy matey", slightly-camp kind either) Introduction (or "hopefully shocking you into wanting to know more").
Ok lets start by getting a few things straight, firstly piracy exists today much as it has for centuries, except today's pirates use everything from machetes to machine guns, and their crimes range from petty theft to stealing entire ships and kidnapping crews for ransom. Furthermore some of them might be after more than just "treasure" to bury on desert islands, there's a good chance some of them want to get their hands on commercial shipping boats for the same reason the 9-11 terrorists wanted commercial airliners. Secondly, Australia's northern waters are the most pirate-prone in the world, particularly the straits of Malacca running between Malaysia/Singapore and Indonesia. More disturbing still are predictions that waters around Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands are likely to prove increasing dangerous in coming years due to poor levels of governance and law enforcement in those states. Finally piracy is on the rise, with the International Maritime Bureau recording a 20% rise in attacks as compared to the previous year resulting in twice as many deaths. Why is it so bad in Asia? Two reasons - weak/poor/corrupt governments and lots and lots of poor people desperate for an income. To be blunt, Indonesia is virtually broke, and so the military is forced to rely on non-state funds for approximately half its annual budget. Often these resources come from legitimate businesses, but as the Indonesian economy struggles to recover from the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis, increasingly the military is turning to crime to cover its costs. For example, in September 2002 a turf war broke out over drug running in North Sumatra between the military and the local police led to a gunfight that killed eight. Former Defence Minister Juwono Sudarsono says the military's illegal activities include drug smuggling, protection rackets, illegal mining and logging, fuel smuggling, gambling and prostitution. This story of corruption within the law enforcement and military establishments is played out again and again across Southeast Asia. An investigation by the ABC television program Foreign Correspondent revealed the scandalous lack of maritime supervision and security that exists across the southern Philippines, Malaysian Borneo and Eastern Indonesia. In the Sulu region of the Philippines there is only one aging patrol boat to police the entire region's waterways, which are used by thousands of people each day. This capability is not simply inadequate to the task, but worse still is the fact that officials often misuse this scarce resource to conduct their own smuggling operations!. Last year the Indonesian Navy's Chief of Staff Admiral Bernard Kent Sondakh wrote an article in the Jakarta Post that said 200 more patrol boats were needed to guard Indonesian waters, and of the boats the Navy currently has, only 30% are seaworthy. On top of the inadequate law-enforcement capabilities in Southeast Asia, another problem that aids pirates and terrorists is the ready availability of "Flags of Convenience" (FOC) which is where states (even landlocked states like Bolivia) establish shipping registries available to any shipowner with the cash to buy a licence, and to pay the tax on tonnage. The following 27 countries have been declared FOCs by the International Transport-workers Federation's (ITF) Fair Practices Committee (a joint committee of ITF seafarers' and dockers' unions) which runs the ITF campaign against FOCs: Antigua and Barbuda, Aruba (Netherlands), Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Bermuda (UK), Burma, Cambodia, Canary Islands (Spain), Cayman Islands (UK), Cook Islands (New Zealand), Cyprus, German International Ship Register (GIS), Gibraltar (UK), Honduras, Lebanon, Liberia, Luxembourg, Malta, Marshall Islands (USA), Mauritius, Netherlands Antilles, Panama, St. Vincent, Sri Lanka, Tuvalu, Vanuatu. Roughly 50% of all shipping is done under a FOC. Apart from the lower registration and taxation costs, shipowners take out a FOC in order to evade domestic and international laws regarding the working conditions of crew (eg. US flagged ships must employ American seafarers), inspection of cargo and as a shield against various forms of litigation (for, say, spills). In security terms, the problem with FOC's is that they provide a simple and affordable way for criminals to re-brand stolen ships, making them difficult to trace. These vessels can then be used for other criminal or terrorist activities with a high degree of impunity. But is it really a big deal? Well there is some fairly obvious stuff, like Australians involved in maritime transport operations might be kidnapped or killed, in much the same way that four Thai fishermen were kidnapped after pirates seized their boat in the Malacca Strait in May 2004. The fishermen tried to outrun the pirates but were easily caught and the kidnappers are demanding US$11,000 for their return. At present their fate is unknown. More of these sorts of incidents will have clear economic impacts, given that the vast majority of Australian imports and exports are shipped, as is the majority of the world's trade, and so if foreign countries may become hesitant to take the risk of trading with Australia because its proximity to the global epicentre of piracy. But it could be about to get much worse. According to Aegis Defence Services, some militants are using the prevalence of piracy in Southeast Asia as a cover to learn how to operate different types of watercraft for future terrorist attacks. Two examples cited in The Economist offer the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) as a good example of the convergence between criminal and terrorist activities. ASG kidnapped a man from a Sabah (Malaysia) resort in 2000, and on his release in June 2003, he revealed that his kidnappers had targeted him because he was a diving instructor and that they had wanted instruction. Similarly the owner of a diving school near Kuala Lumpur has recently reported a number of ethnic Malays wanting to learn about diving, but being strangely uninterested in learning about safe decompression. Given that some US flight instructors were "concerned" in 2001 that several Saudi Arabian men were only interested in learning how to steer, but not how to land, commercial aircraft and this turned out to be fairly important information, these eerily reminiscent reports should be no less worrying. How likely is the threat of maritime terrorism? At present terrorist attacks against maritime assets represent only 1% of all terrorist incidents worldwide, but with approximately 46,000 merchant ships, carrying around 5.8 billion tonnes (80% of world trade) served by over 4000 ports around the globe, maintaining security is a daunting and vital task. Even the US military was unable to protect the guided-missile destroyer USS Cole from a crippling suicide bombing in 2000 in which 17 crewmen were killed, so it's not difficult to imagine the risk to civil operations, particularly in developing nations. Worse still is the risk that a hijacked ship, especially a tanker carrying oil or chemicals, might become a floating bomb or environmental catastrophe. Clearly militants are aware of the potential of these sorts of attacks, as evidenced by the attack on the French oil tanker "Limberg" in 2002 and the April 24 attack in Iraq on the Basra oil terminal involving 3 "suicide speedboats". Although the facility was not damaged during this incident that is hardly a reason to discount the risk of future attacks of this type. When this plethora of targets (and weapons) is considered alongside the growing phenomenon of suicide bombings it should be clear that Australia (and the world) face a new crisis of considerable dimensions. So what can be done about it? Well given that Indonesia announced in May 2000 that it would establish a special taskforce to combat piracy, and yet most of the Navy is in dry-dock and the stats show the problem is getting worse, its clear the nations of Southeast Asia can't resolve this issue on their own. A typically gung-ho American Admiral Thomas Fargo (responsible for the US military in the Asia-Pacific) told Congress earlier this month that the US would soon begin naval patrols in the pirate-prone regions, but since Malaysia or Indonesia reacted angrily to the suggestion its unlikely to happen. This is yet another example of a good idea, that wont get off the ground because of American diplomatic ineptitude. It's a shame because since the middle of last year NATO warships have been escorting allied flagged commercial vessels through the Strait of Gibraltar at the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea. The channel, which separates Morocco from Spain, is roughly as vital to world shipping as the Malacca Strait, although piracy is significantly less common. Meanwhile, Australia's Navy struggle to stop illegal fishing because its boats aren't fast enough and criminals can get all the way to South America before we catch them. So don't hold your breath waiting for Howard to save the day. The answer has to be enhanced cooperation between ASEAN members and other affected parties like Australia, New Zealand, US, China, Japan (etc) and greater military aid to impoverished Asia-Pacific states. For example, the Indonesian 'Coast Guard' bases often lack even passive night-vision equipment and so can't operate at night. Meanwhile in the US they spend millions to fingerprint and photograph every visitor at airports. Excellent. There are some other positive signs though. Early in 2003, 11 nations established the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI), which has quickly grown to include a total membership of Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Singapore, Spain, the UK and the US, with up to 60 other nations expressing their interest or support. DFAT describes the PSI as a commitment by member-states to disrupting the illicit trade in WMD by interdicting vessels, aircraft or other modes of transport in their territory or territorial waters that are reasonably suspected of carrying suspicious cargo. In October 2003, the US, UK, Germany and Italy acting under the auspices of the PSI stopped an illegal cargo of centrifuge parts for uranium enrichment destined for Libya. In September 2003 (around the time of my birthday incidentally, but no-one cares about that) members of the PSI held their first training exercise, operation "Pacific Protector" in the Coral Sea. In a simulated mission, naval vessels from Australia, the US, Japan and France tracked a mock-smuggler ship and then Japanese commando's boarded the vessel from helicopters with the assistance of Australian forces (we carried the oranges). All jokes aside (just for a moment), programs like the PSI may be the first step to a new regime of anti-proliferation that finally enforces many of the agreements meant to stop the illicit trade in WMD and other contraband. Australia is particularly interested in this sort of aggressive maritime interdiction policy after the SAS seized the North Korean ship the Pong Su which was smuggling at least 125kg of heroin, that's the amount that was recovered anyway, making it one of the largest drug busts in Australian history. The ship was impounded and the crew, including a member of North Korea's ruling "Workers Party" were charged with drug offences. Australia also sent a strongly worded letter of protest to the Government of North Korea (Australia is one of the very few western nations that has formal diplomatic ties to Pyongyang) and John Howard took Kim Jong Il off his Christmas card list. But as you may have noticed, very few ASEAN members are PSI members, in fact only Singapore. So clearly this initiative or something like it, needs to be taken up by states in the region to address the worst case scenario's of piracy and terrorism - which is maritime terrorism involving WMD. Maybe if Admiral Fargo hadn't upset Malaysia and Indonesia by unilaterally declaring the US's intention to police the waters of Southeast Asia, then there might be a chance of Washington convincing ASEAN members to sign a similar agreement to what Panama and Liberia recently accepted. Panama has the world's largest shipping registry and Liberia comes a close second, and both are notorious providers of FOC. The US managed to get both governments approval to allow US officials to board any ships sailing under Panamian or Liberian flags, if they are suspected of carrying WMD. Its an amazing outcome, and although either government may still refuse to allow a vessel to be boarded on a specific occasion, even signing such an agreement is a massive shift in policy for the world's leaders in dodgy ship registry. Unfortunately there is much, much more that needs to be done, but the good news is that there's lots to debate - about what will work, what is needed, etc, etc. But it's an interesting debate and one that is a bit new and different from the usual Asian-security issues commonly used for topics and definitions. Future articles for the MAD website will develop this issue by looking at the South Pacific - one of the truly screwed up regions of the earth - and maybe if more if I can be bothered. Back to MAD Homepage |