The pirates of the 21st Century

   A few hundred years ago the greatest menace for every European seafarer were the pirates of the Caribbean Sea. Nowadays the most dangerous zone of pirate activities is considered to be the coasts of Somalia where a ship is being captured almost every week. The pirates have attached 100 million dollar oil tankers, as well as a Ukrainian ship with a mysterious weapons shipment on-board. Latvian sailor Jevgeņijs Grigorjevs was captured by pirates in the end of 2007 and spent more than four months (133 tormenting days) in the mercy of Somalian pirates on a floating prison and suffered serious hardships. The prison was made out of the Ukrainian ship Faina Now he is back with his family in Latvia.
After the hijacking the ship is usually brought closer to the Somalian shores where the pirates keep it and wait for the ransom. The negotiations with the owners of the ship usually last for a few weeks and most of the owners agree to pay the 500 000 to 2 000 000 $ price for their ships and crews. The size of the ransom usually depends on the cargo. When the pirates discovered weapons on Faina, they demanded a 35 000 000 $ ransom, they lowered the price to 20 000 000 later, though. The ship was soon surrounded by US battleships who threatened the pirates that they would see to it that the cargo doesn’t reach Islamic combatants, and thus the pirates had to lower their demands.
Due to the overall poverty in Somalia, piracy has become the most lucrative business. Kenyan officials have estimated that the Somalian pirates have received more than 150 000 $ in a year. Somalia is one of the poorest countries in the world and piracy can provide much higher living conditions for the „businessmen”. Piracy has become a prestigious business in Somalia. A few years ago there were only some 100 pirates in the region, but their numbers have swelled since then and now it is estimated that there are more than 1500 of them. The pirates actually hold the economy of the coastal region in their hands.
Pirate attacks. Incidents in 2010.
The most dangerous sailing areas in the South America are near the shores of Peru and Venezuela. The West-African pirates are the most active near Accra in Ghana and near Lagos in Nigeria. In the East-Africa, there have been some attacks near Tanzania, Kenya as well as the Eastern shore of Somalia and the Aden gulf, that separates Africa and the Arabian peninsula.
Pirate attacks are also common near the Indian ports and the coasts of Bangladesh.
In the South-East-Asian region piracy is most active in the Malacca Strait between the Malaysia and the Indonesia, as well as the sea near the Singapore harbor.
The article was created, using a Youtube movie and articles from the newspaper „Diena”.