Pirates take four European tourists hostage

[southern_belle]

Source: CNN

Pirates took four European tourists hostage after their yacht ran out of fuel off the coast of northern Somalia in the Red Sea's Gulf of Aden, according to a Somaliland official.

The pirates then took their hostages -- a man, woman, their child and their yacht's pilot -- into hills around the fishing town of Las Qoray, said Ahmed Yusuf Yasin, vice president of the self-declared Republic of Somaliland.

Somaliland soldiers and local residents were searching for the pirates in an effort to free the hostages, Yasin said.

Las Qoray is in a territory claimed by both Puntland, a self-declared autonomous state, and Somalia. The two sides clashed over the disputed land earlier this year.


Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/africa/06/24/pirates.somalia/index.html

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The tourists are believed to be French or German.

[slackmaster]

1. Civilized nations need to stop pussy-footing around with pirates

My brother is an officer in the US Navy. He did some piracy intervention work last summer, in conjunction with navies of France and other countries.

His hands were tied. He was prohibited from chasing them into any nation's territorial waters even while in hot pursuit. His responses to aggressive action on the part of the pirates were hamstrung. Basically he had to let them get away most of the time.

[slampoet]

7. "Civilized nations need to stop pussy-footing around with pirates" that a Thomas Jefferson Quote??

Sounds like something from the Barbary Pirates days.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbary



We have been dealing with pirates for 400+ years as a nation.

Every nation with a seaport goes through the same thing.

[riverdeep]

13. They could do what China did, capture and execute them.

"China executed 13 Chinese and Indonesian pirates in South China's Guangdong Province on January 28 (2000) who in November 1998 robbed the Cheung Son cargo ship from Hong Kong and killed all 23 sailors on board.

They robbed the ship and killed all of the 23 seamen. Later they sold the contraband for 300,000 US dollars. They also stole a total of 970,00 yuan in cash."

http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/english/200001/29/eng20000129N103.html

Of course, here the crew were all dead, and the load stolen, so the Chinese government had nothing to lose by aggressively going after them. It was a public execution. Video is around somewhere. It sends the message in the only terms thugs understand.

[slackmaster]

19. The best our Navy could do was fire warning shots

Thousands of yards from the captured ships. They did sink one or two pirate boats (with nobody on board).

[peace13]

2. Bad place to run our of fuel.

Too sad.

[cobalt1999]

3. Bad place to be a touist.

I can think of 10,000 better places to vacation than anywhere within 1000 miles of Somolia

[MidwestTransplant]

5. Bad place to float by even if you don't run aground.

[merwin]

4. Damn. Pirates have really gotten much worse from the Commodore 64 days.

I remember when all they used to do was crack and distribute software. Now they're kidnapping? Come on!

[cbayer]

6. That's apparently the worst part of a circumnaviation.

You have to go by there to get to the Suez Canal and into the Mediterranean. Most people buddy boat because it is know for pirates.

Very bad news.

[Carnea]

8. Well at least it is good news on the Global Warming Front.

[tabasco]

9. Note to self:

Gas up the yacht before traversing Somali coast.

[riverdeep]

10. Piracy is the well-kept secret of the shipping industry.

Every year, pirates seize ships, all kinds, from small vessels to large container vessels. They don't have swords and eye-patches, they have modern, deadly weapons and high speed boats. They hold the ships, and crew, for ransom, and the shipping companies pay it. But they don't want anyone to know this is going on. The ones carrying passengers obviously don't want their customers to be scared off, and the commercial vessels don't want to publicize the fact that the pirates' methods work.

Everyone hears the word 'pirate' and thinks, 'oh, isn't that quaint, 'arrghh matey.' But it's a big deal, and crews have been exectued. Many crews aren't allowed to carry weapons, sometimes because of the nature of the load (oil tanker, for example) and sometimes the shipping company thinks fighting back would put them in more danger. Some contract out a special security team to traverse with the ship, but many can't afford this luxury. The only weapons available to them are water canons or special sound directional weapons.

And Somalia is one of the most dangerous places for piracy there is. If you're considering a cruise, this is stuff you should know about. Stay away from third world nations. Those tourists are in serious trouble.

[cobalt1999]

11. Pirates have always been ruthless

In their time, they had the "modern weaponry", stole, killed, & raped with abandon. It wasn't the Hollywood/Johnny Depp pirates.

Amazing the press seems to be focusing more and more on these attacks although they've been going on for a long time.

[Mike Daniels]

12. Yep, Hollywood glamorized the pirate to where people think of them as "rebels"

fighting against an oppresive society.

Part of the "glamour" of piracy is due to the fact that life on a pirate ship was mostly democratic compared to life on equivalent period navy or merchant vessels.

That's about as far as the glamour goes as pirates were to a man pretty much the dregs of society, cruel and sadistic, and usually gave their captives one of two options - "follow us into piracy or die".

My dad worked on various merchant ships and while he never directly experienced an attack he told me that the ships did carry a few guns on board just in case the ship had to cruise through pirate hunting grounds.

[One_Life_To_Give]

20. Funny most Piracy is in Asia

the link below shows most piracy is not on the East Coast of Africa. But in Asia and on the West Coast of Africa.

icc-ccs.org/extra/display.php

Piracy off of Singapore has been a problem for decades. Alot of money to be had off of a hijacked ship full of Intel processors. Pound for pound far more valuable than platinum.

And don't forget Paul Cayard the "Americas Cup" among other events sailor. Killed by pirates on the Amazon river.

[dysfunctional press]

14. it could be worse- instead of somalia, it could have happened at disneyland

[skoalyman]

15. shoot I think Id rather turn an old ww2 warship into a yacht

wouldn't have to worry about pirates then lol

[entanglement]

16. A Somaliland elder is attempting to negotiate with the pirates to release the tourists

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7471150.stm

[KillCapitalism]

17. If our Navy should really be anywhere right now

it should be there off the coast of Africa. These pirates are awful and really need to be dealt with.

[and-justice-for-all]

18. Piracy is terrorism...nt