Nick Wadhams

They're baaack

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water... they're back! Those pesky pirates. Let the jokes resume.

This time, the buccaneers have captured the Sirius Star, a VLCC (Very Large Crude Carrier... duh) carrying 2 million barrels of, um, crude. Most disturbing of all, they did it 450 miles south of their usual patch.

It was a funny thing at a news conference today with Britain's Armed Forces Minister, the Rt. Hon. Bob Ainsworth. The Rt. Hon. opened the event with a statement praising British Marines for "interdicting" (his description) a boatload of pirates a few days back. "That sounds impressive," I thought.

Then something caught my attention. He referred to the interdicted vessel as a dhow. A dhow? I'd had images of a big pirate vessel being swarmed by British commandos. A quick Google search later, and I'd found a pic:

That was it? Golly, not so impressive. I guess any interdiction is a good thing, but the picture made me chuckle. I remember in early October, one editor I write for now and again shot down the idea of a story about pirates having seized that ship full of tanks because he thought the World would bust some heads and liberate the vessel before the story saw daylight.

Two months later, here we are. The MV Faina remains moored somewhere off the coast of Somalia. As various NATO and American task forces talk the talk, pirates roam the seas at will, and seize one of the largest sea-going vessels on the planet.

Just a thought

Our fair Nairobi press corps has gotten good mileage in the last couple weeks out of the Somali pirates story. The pirate spokesman, Sugule Ali, is written about with great snark and bemusement. Some have made great bones about speaking with him (Hey! I'm interviewing a real-life pirate! Look at me! No hands!) even though he has been quoted more often, and by more people, than Britney Spears.

An enchanting job Ali has done, indeed. Amid all the Johnny Depp comparisons and pirate accents, people seem to have forgotten that along with the 20 hostages aboard the Faina, the pirates are holding all of Somalia captive. They're called pirates because they go around in boats. Otherwise, they're no different than zonked-out kids with guns manning roadblocks and extorting cash from all the passers by.

Actually, they're a lot worse. I hate to get all self-righteous, but c'mon, folks. As 52 NGO's said today, half of Somalia's 7 million people are in critical need of food aid. I thought the release was extraordinarily well-timed. Sobers you up a bit when you start feeling inclined to write another cute story about how you interviewed the pirates (Wacky, huh?!). The World Food Program supplies aid to about 2.5 million, and its shipments now must be escorted by the military because pirates hijacked three WFP ships in the last three years. That's pretty sick _ hijacking ships with food aid.

I suppose it's a good thing that attention is turning to Somalia, even if everyone is missing the point. Somalia now faces as big a crisis as it has in its history. Hopefully these idiotic pirates, by seizing a bunch of tanks and embarrassing the world into maybe doing something, have just done themselves in. I doubt it, unfortunately.

A source I spoke with today said some things I found interesting. Ultimately, I couldn't put any of it in a story I wrote. For obvious reasons, the person did not want to be identified in any way.

"These perverts are pimping out the survival of millions, not just a handful of hapless sailors being held for ransom. This is not funny. It paints a picture of just how fucked up the Horn is. Kenya's corruption meets Somalia's opportunists and everyone is making millions off the increasing instability in south Sudan where elections are due to be held next year. You sort of have to admit there's a crime problem in a neighborhood when a street kid sticks up a mafia capo's truck and finds out it's loaded with with false passports for Lehmann Brothers."

The Great Parrot Rescue

Just got this press release:

OVER 1000 AFRICAN PARROTS RESCUED FROM DEADLY ILLEGAL TRADE

"Over 1,200 exotic African Grey Parrots have been seized from traffickers in Cameroon after 2 two shipments were intercepted by the Ministry of Forests and Wildlife in Douala International Airport. The parrots were being illegally shipped to Bahrain and Mexico for the exotic pet trade, and are now being cared for by the Limbe Wildlife Centre (LWC). 'As you can imagine it was pandemonium here when they all arrived, squashed into tiny crates, the live birds standing on top of their dead cage mates. It was a terrible scene' says Felix Lankester, Chief Veterinarian of LWC., that has now received 2 truckloads of the dying parrots."

No word yet if they will meet the same fate as 440 ground squirrels intercepted in Amsterdam a few years back.