Fighting piracy on dry land

·         navies of 30 nations operate in indian ocean to protect merchanidse shipments from piracy

·         yet pirates managed to attack 237 times in 2011 against 219 in 2010

·         over 150 sailors are still captive with 10 ships

·         root cause of piracy is the failed state

·         somalia ahs remained without a real government since 1991

·         the transition government supported by west has contorl only on mogadishu

·         fall of somalia state had detrimental impact on somalian coast of puntland

·         foreign trawlers enetered puntland fishing grounds and destroyed their traditional source of income

·         the puntland fisherman had no funds to upgrade nor market access

·         this forced several young men to take to piracy

·         piracy kicked off in 2005

·         now it earns close to 200 mn $ a year

·         piracy is costing world 7-12 bn $ a year

·         most of governments have agreed to provide armed guards on the ships to protect from pirates

·         but no amount of armed intervention will help curb piracy

way ahead

·         most of piracy money is spent in buying houses, cars etc

·         hence international development intervention can help cut off the incentive to take to piracy

·         this requries great courage to operate in the dangerous region