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Pirates take 1,181 hostages in 2010

Jan. 20, 2011 - 11:19 By 박한나
NAIROBI (AP) ― Pirates captured a record 1,181 hostages in 2010 ― almost all of them off the Somali coast ― during a year in which hijackings and attacks became more violent, a global maritime watchdog said.

Attackers seized 53 vessels worldwide in 2010, according to a report released Tuesday by the International Maritime Bureau’s piracy reporting center in Kuala Lumpur. All but four were taken by Somali pirates.

“More people were taken hostage at sea in 2010 than in any year since records began” in 1991, said the annual report.

Pirates are using hijacked vessels to hunt ships from Mozambique to Oman, an “unprecedented” growth in range, said the report.

Using hijacked vessels to catch new prey also made navies more reluctant to intervene. Pirates have sometimes threatened to kill their captives if attacks were interfered with.
The guided-missile destroyer USS Bainbridge (DDG 96) tows the lifeboat from the Maersk Alabama in the Indian Ocean.  (Bloomberg)


The brief summaries of important attacks offer a rare glimpse into the struggle on the high seas.

Pirates firing automatic weapons and grenades attacked the MV Yasin C in April. The crew locked themselves in the sweltering engine room for more than a day while a fire ignited by a grenade raged above. The pirates eventually left after being unable to get into the engine room.

In June, the captain of a Panamanian cargo ship was killed in a shoot-out between Somali forces and pirates on board his ship. And in an October hijacking, a South African skipper risked execution when he refused to leave his yacht, the Choizil. He and the yacht were abandoned and later rescued but his two companions were taken.

The Somali attacks accounted for 1,016 of the hostages held for ransom, the center said. Somali pirates currently hold 31 vessels and 713 crew members of various nationalities after hijacking another four ships so far this year, IMB said.

Thirteen crew members were wounded and eight died in Somali pirate incidents in 2010, up from four who died and 10 who were wounded in 2009. There were no pirate killings elsewhere in the world in 2010.

Lawless Somalia’s long coastline snakes around the Horn of Africa and provides the perfect base for pirate dens. The country has not had a functioning government since a socialist dictatorship collapsed in 1991, plunging the nation into clan-based civil war.

An international flotilla of warships patrols waters threatened by Somali pirates, particularly the Gulf of Aden corridor leading to the Suez Canal. Attacks in that area fell more than 50 percent, from 117 in 2009 to 53 in 2010.

The report attributed the fall to the presence of warships and more crews using recommended management practices. Sixteen hijackings were averted when the crew took refuge in a reinforced room, often called a “citadel” and fitted with two-way communications, food and water, the report said. But the area where ships are under threat is too vast to be protected by warships alone.

“If you’re going to have a force to fight piracy, it’s more sensible to do it on land than at sea,” said Roger Middleton, a piracy expert at British think tank Chatham House.

The weak, U.N.-backed Somali administration is too tied up fighting an Islamist insurgency to fight piracy. A series of corrupt and ineffective governments plundered government coffers, leading to widespread desertions when soldiers went unpaid.

Globally, there were 445 pirate attacks worldwide last year, a 10 percent rise from 2009, the center said.

Violent attacks and armed robberies were also notable in Indonesian waters, where 30 vessels were boarded. Bangladesh had 21 vessels boarded, mainly by attackers armed with knives at the port of Chittagong, while Nigeria had 13, mostly near the port of Lagos.

<한글 기사> 

"작년 해적 피랍 1천181명..20년래 최다"


(쿠알라룸푸르) 지난해 전세계 바다에서 해적에 납치된 사람이 1천181명으로 1991년 집계 이래 최악이었다고 민간조직인 국제해사국(IMB)이 18일 밝혔다. 

말레이시아 쿠알라룸푸르 소재 IMB 해적신고센터는 이날 연례보고서에서 같은 기간 해적에 납치된 선박도 53척에 달했고 피랍자 중 8명이 목숨을 잃었다고 전했다.

센터는 피랍 선박 가운데 단 4척을 뺀 49척이 모두 소말리아 해역에서 납치됐고 이 해역에서 납치된 사람도 1천16명으로 90%에 육박했다. 

센터 보고서에 따르면 지난 4년간 해적의 공격 건이 꾸준히 증가했으며 지난해(445건)는 전년에 비해 10%나 늘었다. 피랍자 수도 2006년 188명이었다가 2009년 1천 50명으로 급증했다. 

또한 지난해말 기준으로 28척의 배와 함께 638명이 억류된 상태다. 

해적신고센터의 포텐갈 무쿤단 국장은 소말리아 해역에서는 중무장 해적들이 어선과 상선을 강탈한 뒤 선원들을 강압해 인근의 다른 선박을 공격하고 있다고 지적 했다.

(연합뉴스)