The frustration of Pirates?
Join Date: Nov 2000
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PTT - I believe that Piracy is a symptom of greed not poverty.
I spent 4 years in the UN's declared "poorest country" in the world with a raging civil war and inept government much like Somalia. It has a 1600 mile coastline bordering the same ocean, however, there was no piracy problem.
Street crime was minor and "relatively wealthy" expats were non targetted.
Stik
I spent 4 years in the UN's declared "poorest country" in the world with a raging civil war and inept government much like Somalia. It has a 1600 mile coastline bordering the same ocean, however, there was no piracy problem.
Street crime was minor and "relatively wealthy" expats were non targetted.
Stik
Add that to wealthy nations parading millions of dollars' worth of national resource just of your coast and you're going to get resentful and angry - it's human nature. Now give people the capability (guns) and opportunity (lawless, failed state) to act against those resources by hijacking them and you have piracy.
Resolve the poverty and you remove the motivation, resolving the issue for many.
Join Date: Oct 2002
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This is beginning to sound like a Woody Allen farce. Now we have anti-piracy RW assets being called in by one group of pirates to protect them from a second group of pirates...as they collect their $5.5 mil ransom.
Pirates have shootout over oil tanker release
Reminiscent of that classic episode of COPS: "Officer, that drug dealer stole my $20..."
I/C
Pirates have shootout over oil tanker release
A shootout between rival Somali pirate gangs over their biggest ransom ever threatened to turn an oil supertanker and the 28 hostages aboard into a massive fireball until bandits begged the anti-piracy force for help, a negotiator said Monday.
A group of pirates showed up in two speedboats just before a $5.5 million ransom was to be dropped by parachute onto the Maran Centaurus. Two helicopters from a nearby warship intervened, hovering over the attacking skiffs. Just the powerful draft beating down from their rotors was enough to frighten off the attackers, and the gunships did not fire.
After the helicopters chased away the attackers, two planes arrived and the huge bundle of cash was pushed out the back of one with a parachute attached. The pirates left the ship Monday morning.
"It's really remarkable: You have the criminals calling on the police to come and help them," said pirate expert Roger Middleton from London-based think tank Chatham House, who said it was the first time he could recall such a situation.
A group of pirates showed up in two speedboats just before a $5.5 million ransom was to be dropped by parachute onto the Maran Centaurus. Two helicopters from a nearby warship intervened, hovering over the attacking skiffs. Just the powerful draft beating down from their rotors was enough to frighten off the attackers, and the gunships did not fire.
After the helicopters chased away the attackers, two planes arrived and the huge bundle of cash was pushed out the back of one with a parachute attached. The pirates left the ship Monday morning.
"It's really remarkable: You have the criminals calling on the police to come and help them," said pirate expert Roger Middleton from London-based think tank Chatham House, who said it was the first time he could recall such a situation.
I/C
Last edited by Ian Corrigible; 18th Jan 2010 at 19:25.
