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EUROPEAN UNION SUB-COMMITTEE FOR EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Turning the Tide on Piracy, Building Somalia’s Future: Follow-up
report on the EU’s Operation Atalanta and beyond
Oral and written evidence
Contents
Mr Jean-Paul Adam, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Republic of Seychelles – Oral evidence (Q1
– QQ18) ........................................................................................................................................................ 2
Adjoa Anyimadu – Oral evidence (QQ19 – QQ63) ........................................................................ 15
Dr Knox Chitiyo – Oral evidence (QQ19 – QQ63) ....................................................................... 46
Chamber of Shipping - Written evidence ........................................................................................... 47
Council of Somali Organisations - Written evidence ...................................................................... 51
Department for International Development – Oral evidence (QQ109 – 175) ......................... 89 Foreign and Commonwealth Office – Oral evidence (QQ109 – 175) ...................................... 119
Evidence to be found under Department for International Development ............................... 119
Foreign and Commonwealth Office – Supplementary written evidence .................................. 119
Christian Le Mière, Research Fellow for Naval Forces and Maritime Security International
Institute for Strategic Studies – Written evidence ......................................................................... 123
Lloyd’s Market Association – Written evidence ............................................................................. 126
Ministry of Defence – Oral evidence (QQ64 – QQ108) ............................................................. 128
Nick Harvey MP, Minister of State for the Armed Forces – Oral evidence (QQ64 – QQ108)
.................................................................................................................................................................... 154
Alexander Rondos – Oral evidence (QQ176 – QQ234) ............................................................. 155
Dr Lee Willett – Oral evidence (QQ19 – QQ63) ......................................................................... 185
Dr Lee Willett – Supplementary written evidence ........................................................................ 185
Mr Jean-Paul Adam, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Republic of Seychelles – Oral evidence (Q1 – QQ18)
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Mr Jean-Paul Adam, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Republic of
Seychelles – Oral evidence (Q1 – QQ18)
Evidence Session No. 1. Heard in Public. Questions 1 - 18
THURSDAY 14 JUNE 2012
Members present
Lord Teverson (Chairman)
Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury
Lord Boswell of Aynho
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Henig
Lord Inge
Lord Jay of Ewelme
Lord Jopling
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
Lord Radice
Lord Trimble
Lord Williams of Elvel
Baroness Young of Hornsey
________________
Examination of Witness
Mr Jean-Paul Adam, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Republic of Seychelles.
Q1 The Chairman: Minister, can I welcome you very much to the House of Lords EU
External Affairs Sub-Committee? Can I just go through the housekeeping, just to make sure
everybody is aware? First of all, this is a public session and it will be transcribed and
recorded. We will give you an opportunity to see that transcription so that if there is an
error on it you are able to change that, but it is a public session and they are far more
valuable as that. This is the first of our sessions in our inquiry following up a report we
undertook some two years ago on Somali piracy and particularly EU Atalanta. We are an EU
Select Committee so we look particularly from the European point of view. As you are well
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aware, we will have to end the session by about 9.25 or 9.30 am, so I have asked Members
to keep their questions and supplementaries short, but we are keen to get into a dialogue. I
know you are keen to make a short opening statement, so perhaps, Minister, you would like
to do that and then we will move into the questions.
Jean-Paul Adam: Thank you very much, Lord Teverson and your Lordships. It really is a
great honour for me to be here, and I appreciate very much that time is of the essence so I
will be as quick and brief as possible. Perhaps I can start by saying that I do believe the
relationship between Seychelles and the United Kingdom on piracy is a strategic one, and
one that has been very positive. I am going to start with that statement because then I will
immediately say, of course, we are still not doing enough. I want to start with that statement
because I think that the United Kingdom is giving very strong leadership on the matter, but
there is still a lot to be done.
One of the key points I will make is that, in terms of the international community, we are
almost treating piracy as an acceptable symptom that we can live with, in the way that we
are set up to deal with it. A lot of the practices the pirates are involved with, if we
transposed those activities and look at them on land, we would never have accepted as being
acceptable to any form of trade and we must be much more robust and direct in dealing
with the problem. I will not bore you with too many figures, but the Indian Ocean, where
Seychelles is based, is the third-largest ocean and sees two-thirds of the world’s oil
shipments going through its waters, 50% of containerised cargo and one-third of bulk cargo.
It is also home to 40% of the world’s offshore oil production, so it really is a strategic area.
Piracy is a global problem because of that, not just for the island states or the coastal states
of the Indian Ocean.
For Seychelles we have seen revenue from fisheries reduced by almost 30%. With tourism
revenue, there is a dichotomy because in tourism overall we are growing by 15%. The
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economy as a whole is growing by 3%, but in the specific areas of tourism that depend on,
for example, catamarans, leasing of boats, cruise ships and so on, it is down to almost zero,
meaning that we have had to almost shut down that part of the tourism economy. Fuel
bunkering, which is a part of our economy—we buy fuel and we re-export it—has reduced
by 35% and that is directly due to piracy. The core problem for Seychelles is that we are a
very isolated economy. We depend on trade. We import 95% of our needs, so there is a
huge inflationary problem due to piracy. This is why we have been so active on it because we
realise that we cannot afford not to do anything, so we have been at the forefront.
In terms of solutions for piracy, I think very strongly we must start, first of all, with a very
basic principle and that is looking at the oceans as a development space comparable to that
of the land. We have to develop a view of the ocean as being as important as land and not
looking at it as a secondary space. There have been large improvements in the co-ordination
of the fight against piracy, much more robust action by the European Union Atalanta forces,
including interventions on land. That is welcomed by Seychelles, and we do feel it has been
done in the right way because the interim Somali Government has also accepted it. I would
not say they necessarily welcome it, but they have accepted it as part of the fight and as
something necessary. Also, the regional Governments, such as Somaliland and Puntland, have
also accepted it.
There is still a problem of impunity overall dealing with piracy and this is why Seychelles
particularly has come in. I will just touch on some of the things that we have done. We
passed a new law on piracy, which is very much linked to the International Law of the Sea.
We are one of the few countries that have more or less domesticated all of the aspects of
the Law of the Sea. We are prosecuting pirates. We currently have over 100 Somalis serving
sentences—well, some are awaiting trial and some are serving sentences in our prisons. We
established a high-level committee to co-ordinate all the action against piracy and we signed
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various status of forces agreements, which allow international forces to send vessels to our
waters. We have also undertaken prisoner transfers, meaning that pirates arrested by
European Union forces, by the US and by other parties including China and India can then be
transferred to Seychelles for prosecution.
The problem that we face is that we have had one prison—it was built by the United
Nations Office on Drugs and Crime—which had a capacity of 60. I say it is a prison, but it is
actually a wing that was added to our prison. We already have over 100 prisoners and that
was in the space of one year, so we are already at capacity. In any case, we have always said
that as a small country we cannot afford to hold prisoners forever, so we have put a lot of
emphasis on the importance of transferring prisoners back to Somalia to serve their
sentence. In February, we had a breakthrough in that we agreed with the autonomous
Government of Somaliland that they would take a group of 20 Somali prisoners, and we have
undertaken that transfer in the month of March. So we have those 20 prisoners that are
serving 10-year sentences for piracy crimes, and they are currently serving them in a prison
in Hargeisa in Somaliland. That prison is being monitored by UN experts and everything is
proceeding correctly for the moment. We believe quite strongly that that is the way
forward, because you will not get regional states that will be prosecuting pirates if they will
be forever bearing the burden of incarceration. It is very important that we have
incarceration in the state of origin, which is also part of actually building the capacity for law
and order in Somalia.
The Chairman: Minister, we are probably going to go on to some of these areas in the
questions.
Jean-Paul Adam: Good. Then the final point I will just mention is that the UK and
Seychelles have also set up a Regional Anti-Piracy Prosecution and Intelligence Centre, which
targets the financiers of piracy, and it is starting work now. There is a grant of £500,000
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from the UK Government to set it up. Perhaps you will ask a few questions, so I will not go
into too much detail. Thank you very much.
Q2 The Chairman: Minister, thank you very much. In fact, you have really answered
most of question 1 and probably the rest as well, but rather than have tea and polite
conversation we will go through. Given the fact, as you say, that the anti-piracy military work
as such is not a long-term solution, perhaps the one thing I would like your view on is
whether the problem is being contained or is still growing. Do you feel it is coming down
and piracy is now seen as a much more risky activity than it was previously? Just a very brief
comment on that.
Jean-Paul Adam: There has been a huge improvement, first of all, in terms of the
effectiveness of the international effort. I would say when Seychelles first started to feel the
effects of piracy, which was around 2009—piracy obviously existed before that but it was
more towards the Gulf of Aden—when it came as far south as Seychelles. We are actually
over 1,200 nautical miles from the coast of Somalia. It is quite a long way, but they have
come that far and even further south now. They are in the Mozambique Channel. There has
been a big, big improvement. First of all, in Seychelles, for example, we have EU surveillance
aircraft and basing them in Seychelles has provided a better picture of the Indian Ocean.
They feed information much more effectively than before. The different forces are speaking
to each other more effectively and the fact that they are intervening on land as well, meaning
they are disrupting pirate groups before they can put to sea, has meant a real decrease in
successful attacks and that is very, very positive.
However, because of the problems on land in Somalia, there is still a very big group of
people that are interested in piracy. What has also happened is that, because there are fewer
successful attacks, in the individual attacks that are successful you see a huge increase in the
request for ransoms. We currently have two of our nationals in Somalia being held, and we
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have had two occasions before where we have had people there and they were released.
Our Government never pays ransoms, but the different companies that were involved may
have paid some money for the two previous ones. Our understanding is that these were
relatively small sums because they were not considered as high value. The two who are
currently being held are fishermen who could not really be considered high-value persons,
but the amounts that are being asked are still in the millions of dollars. There is an increasing
desperation from the pirates and that shows in the tactics that are used, which are more
violent.
Q3 Lord Inge: Again, you have answered a lot of the questions I would have liked to ask.
But can you talk about the particular capabilities that you think are not there in a military
sense? Also, is the speed of reaction of using those capabilities as good as it should be? How
good is the intelligence?
Jean-Paul Adam: Thank you very much for these very pertinent questions. First of all, the
problem with the Indian Ocean is its size. It is a massive space, so you could probably take
the whole of the world’s navies and put them there and then you would have enough. On
the question whether enough is being done, I think the answer will always be no. But things
can be very much improved by increasing the air support, which does help to give more
accurate information, and also by strategically using the forces that we do have. The
disruptions on land in Somalia have been very effective and, if you can multiply that, you stop
them going to sea. That is very, very good.
In terms of the timeliness of the response, again the size of the ocean is against us. Now, in
Seychelles we have worked very closely with our partners. We have 1.3 million square
kilometres of ocean that belongs to Seychelles. That is equivalent of three times the land
mass of South Africa. We are only 85,000 people—we are a tiny country—but our ocean
space is massive. We cannot control that on our own. We have two coastguard vessels,
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which do 24-hour patrols during what we call the piracy season. We use our own aircraft—
we have three—and we also have different European forces that have been stationing
aircraft in Seychelles. There are also three US unmanned drones based in Seychelles, but
those unmanned drones are getting intelligence from Somalia itself.
In terms of the intelligence available, it is good. It could be a lot better. I have to say that the
intelligence sharing from the United States is often not as good as we would like. The
information is often a little bit outdated. It takes some time for it to reach the forces on the
ground. But it is still useful because we have a lot of information about where the pirates are
congregating, and that helps us to also work with our partners in terms of where we
position our assets. I think I have answered most of your questions.
Q4 Lord Inge: You are saying to me that the response, between getting the intelligence
and then giving that intelligence to people that could take action on that intelligence, is too
slow. Is that what you are saying?
Jean-Paul Adam: Overall, it is too slow. What I will say is that, in terms of the co-operation
with EU Atalanta, it has been excellent—I would say as good as it can be. But overall, in
terms of what is called the Combined Maritime Forces, it can be vastly improved.
Q5 Lord Inge: Having got that intelligence and identified a target, is the reaction time
acting against that target good enough or not?
Jean-Paul Adam: Based on the assets that are there it is good, but it is still 48 hours in
terms of the size of the ocean.
Q6 The Chairman: Could I ask one thing? We have a copy of a speech you made
recently. It was very impressive. Clearly, what you liked was the fact that you had about five
different agencies or assets in Seychelles. The question that I think is really important to
us—leading on from Lord Inge—which I want to be clear on is: it is great having Ocean
Shield assets, US drones and a Luxembourg civilian charter airplane, but do those agencies
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actually co-ordinate what they all do or do they all go and search the same area? Do they
then swap that intelligence? That is what I think we need to understand.
Jean-Paul Adam: They do swap information and the improvement from 2009 to now is
massive. They are vastly improved in terms of the sharing of information and they do not
tread on each other’s toes. There is an understanding that this vessel will be in that area and
so on. But there is more that can be done. We can do more to bring the Chinese and the
Indians into this operation in a more systematic way because they are part of it in terms of
participating in the CMF in a general sense. There can be more effort to bring them in.
Q7 Lord Inge: They do not want to be?
Jean-Paul Adam: No, I think they do, but there are sensitivities on both sides. There are
sensitivities on their side in terms of working and so on, yes.
The Chairman: We need to move on to some of the EU aspects.
Q8 Baroness Young of Hornsey: Minister, thank you for your opening remarks and
your speech. You said in your opening remarks that you felt that somehow piracy was
viewed or is being treated as an acceptable symptom, which I found an interesting remark.
That suggests that somehow things have not been going in quite the right direction. I wonder
if you could tell us—and you have already touched on some of these issues—how well you
think the EU has responded, and what you think are the most important achievements of
Operation Atalanta? Then, finally, what would your view be on the EU strategy around the
Horn of Africa?
Jean-Paul Adam: Thank you. I think that the EU’s effectiveness has improved immensely. My
personal view, and the view of my Government, is that there would be more effectiveness
by giving a bit more resource to the countries of the region. The cost of Atalanta is billions
of euros. This is also a fault of the African nations in that over the years we have not built up
coastguards and we have not built up navies, so the capacity is very limited. In fact, in
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Seychelles with our two vessels we are almost a maritime power in the region because there
is a real lack of capacity. I think in the long term we can do a lot more in terms of building up
the capacity of the regional states to act. The fact that Seychelles is prosecuting pirates
shows that, first of all, we are willing and we have the capability. We have also had occasions
where our vessels have arrested pirates, where we have done the whole chain ourselves,
using and sharing information with other partners. There is a lot more investment that can
be done in the countries of the region themselves and it will actually cost the European
Union less in the long run.
The positive things from the European Union include the fact that we are actually receiving
some additional budget support from the European Union to help mitigate the cost of piracy,
but it is not enough. It is €3 million. Because of the EU rules it is actually not designated for
the fight against piracy work. It is designated as social support—meaning there is recognition
that we are spending more money because of the fight against piracy and, therefore, we
need more support. But because of the rules the EU cannot give us money to spend on the
coastguards, the military and so on. Also, regarding the sums we are talking about, we have
lost 4% of our GDP due to piracy and €3 million is very much appreciated but it does not fit
into the overall question.
The EU has done a very good job and is our first partner in fighting piracy—Atalanta
provides a fantastic effort, given the resources available—and is, I think, investing in the
countries of the region for the long term. Also, we have developed relationships with
Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government, as well as the autonomous Governments of
Somaliland and Puntland. There is a lot of potential for us to look at the countries of the
region also as the interactive players to build the capacity in Somalia, to use what we have
built up in terms of expertise in Seychelles.
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In Seychelles we have now done more piracy trials than any other country. We have over
100 convicted pirates in Seychelles. There have been some cases in Kenya but, apart from
that, most of the expertise is actually in Seychelles. What we have done as well, which has
helped that, is we have had prosecutors from a number of countries—including the UK—
that have been working in Seychelles on these trials.
Q9 Baroness Young of Hornsey: Could I just quickly ask as well whether there is a
good working relationship between the African Union and the EU, in addressing this as a
holistic area?
Jean-Paul Adam: I think there is a good relationship and I salute the efforts of the EU
recently to increase the funding for AMISOM, which, if I am not mistaken, was an increase of
about €100 million. That has already had an impact, in the sense that Somalia is an anarchic
state and there is no other way to control it than having boots on the ground. Definitely the
African Union is best placed to have those boots on the ground because there will be a
sense of imperialism if you bring in other forces. So I think there is a good working
relationship between the African Union and the European Union. Of course there are areas
to be improved but I think overall it is positive.
The Chairman: Lord Radice, did you want to ask anything further?
Q10 Lord Radice: Foreign Minister, in fact I think you said that you have 100 convicted
prisoners and that you are holding a further 100. Is that right?
Jean-Paul Adam: No, not quite. We have in total convicted—I could verify the exact
figure—probably in the region of 140 to 150 and we are currently holding about 100.
Q11 Lord Radice: So those are the two facts?
Jean-Paul Adam: Yes.
Q12 Lord Radice: Do you want to have further capacity?
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Jean-Paul Adam: Not necessarily. We believe, the way we have looked at Seychelles—and
when you say “further capacity”—we have to beef up what we already have, meaning
improving our prison ability to manage holding pirates. The way in which you deal with them
is very different. First of all, Seychelles is a Catholic country. So in terms of having specific
measures in place for holding Muslim prisoners, all of these are things that we have to look
at the capacity of Seychelles to deal with. We would estimate that we would want to hold at
any one time up to 100 prisoners. The idea was that we would prosecute, we would hold
them for three to six months and then we would transfer them to prisons in Somalia. We
have discussed that with the countries of the region, such as Tanzania and Mauritius, that are
willing to prosecute—and Mauritius will be prosecuting as of September—and they agree
with this model as well, meaning that they are very willing to prosecute and hold but they
would not like to be holding these prisoners for long periods of time. The sentences are 10
to 15 years in general and it makes much more sense that they are sent back to Somalia.
This is also a way of sending a clear message to pirates in Somalia that it does not pay, if they
are actually held in prisons in Somalia.
Q13 Lord Jopling: I am very uneasy to know that, having got a prosecution, you are
sending them back to Somalia because you described it yourself as “an anarchic state”. I
would have thought it is only a matter of time before al-Shabaab mounts a raid on the
prisons and has them out. I would have thought it is the last place where you ought to be
sending convicted prisoners for incarceration.
Jean-Paul Adam: It is a very good question and it is one of the first questions we asked. The
issue is that it is an anarchic state and because of that there have been areas of stability that
have been achieved in Somalia. In fact, Somaliland, which is a former British protectorate, has
an autonomous Government and it is there that we have sent our prisoners. The prisons are
monitored by the United Nations. There are UN monitors that are actually partly running
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the prison. What we have seen with the Somaliland Government is that they respond to
carrots. They recognise that if they want to be a viable entity, a viable Government, they
have to have law and order and part of law and order is showing that they are serious on
piracy. The dialogue that the Somaliland autonomous Government has had with the United
Kingdom and with Seychelles has shown that, if they are willing to work on this issue, they
will receive support and capacity building for their own police force, for their own prisons,
and so on, and they see the benefit of that. I think the Government in place there is
committed to undertake this. If we are to look at the long term, it is actually part of building
the stability of Somalia itself.
Q14 Lord Jopling: You say the UN contingency is running the prisons. Are they armed?
Jean-Paul Adam: I would not know off the top of my head.
Q15 Lord Jopling: Could you find out and tell us?
Jean-Paul Adam: I could, yes.
Lord Jopling: Because they jolly well ought to be armed.
Jean-Paul Adam: Yes.
The Chairman: That is a really interesting area and if you were able to give us some more
information that would be good.
Q16 Baroness Henig: Very briefly, just to finish off on the theme of the prisons and the
trials, I am interested in the area of assistance that you have. You mentioned judges from the
UK, which is clearly an area of assistance. You also mentioned budget support from the EU
in terms of €3 million. I wonder whether that went towards these trials in any way.
Jean-Paul Adam: No, it does not.
Q17 Baroness Henig: What assistance then have you had in terms of holding prisoners
and helping to prosecute them?
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Jean-Paul Adam: In terms of holding prisoners and prosecution, most of it has come
through the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Some of that money obviously
originates within EU member states. I am not sure if the EU itself gives money to the
UNODC but we have had a very good relationship with the European Union.
There is another project that is just starting now, which is the regional capacity-building
project and Seychelles will benefit quite significantly under that. It is only just getting under
way—that is why I have not mentioned it—but it is quite a big envelope of money. I am not
sure of the amount but it is quite a big envelope. Seychelles is supposed to benefit, in terms
of training of our police, training of the coastguard, investment in some equipment for the
police and coastguard and so on, as well as prisons and management of prisons.
There is also a regional project. The regional project will be run through the different
regional organisations. Seychelles is a member of what is called the Indian Ocean
Commission, which is a grouping of island states, and we have actually taken the lead to
implement the first phase of €26 million for regional capacity building—and that is EU
money—which will also tackle this capacity building in the region.
Q18 Baroness Henig: So things are getting under way?
Jean-Paul Adam: Things are moving but the problem is always the timeframe. It has taken
us a year just to get all of this off the ground. But yes, there is a lot going on.
The Chairman: Minister, thank you very much indeed for sparing us time with your
schedule. That has given us real insight and an excellent start to our inquiry. We notice very
much the economic impact that this has had on the Seychelles, and any EU money is a small
recompense in comparison with that. I hope this report will in some way help improve the
situation as we move forward. Thank you very much indeed.
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Adjoa Anyimadu – Oral evidence (QQ19 – QQ63)
Evidence Session No. 2. Heard in Public. Questions 19 - 63
THURSDAY 14 JUNE 2012
9.40 am
Witnesses: Adjoa Anyimadu, Dr Knox Chitiyo and
Dr Lee Willett
Members present
Lord Teverson (Chairman)
Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury
Lord Boswell of Aynho
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Henig
Lord Inge
Lord Jay of Ewelme
Lord Jopling Lord Lamont of Lerwick
Lord Radice
Lord Trimble
Lord Williams of Elvel
Baroness Young of Hornsey
________________
Examination of Witnesses
Adjoa Anyimadu, Head Analyst on Somalia, Chatham House; Dr Knox Chitiyo,
Associate Fellow, Chatham House, Brenthurst Foundation, formerly Africa Head, RUSI; and
Dr Lee Willett, Senior Research Fellow in Maritime Studies, RUSI.
Q19 The Chairman: I welcome you to our inquiry. As I have already mentioned, it is our
first day of looking at Somali piracy within an EU context, particularly Operation Atalanta
and the other EU initiatives in the Indian Ocean area. Can I remind you that it is a public
hearing and this session will be webcast and recorded? We will send you a copy of the
transcript, so that if there is anything there that we have made an error on you do have a
Adjoa Anyimadu – Oral evidence (QQ19 – QQ63)
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chance to correct that. I am very keen to move this session straight into questions and
answers, so that we can have a dialogue and take evidence. Thank you for coming and, Dr
Willett, we are very keen to welcome you back after our previous inquiry. Perhaps what I
could ask, though, is just very briefly for you to introduce yourselves both for the public and
for Members of the Committee and then we will start the session. Again, I repeat that I am
not expecting all of you to answer all the questions, but please do contribute to the ones
that you feel are important. We will leave it to you to decide who answers in what order
and how. Ms Anyimadu, perhaps you would like to start and introduce yourself and then we
will work across?
Adjoa Anyimadu: Yes, thank you, Lord Chairman. Good morning. My name is Adjoa
Anyimadu. I work on the Horn of Africa at Chatham House. We have been working on the
Horn for about six years now and I have been part of that project for about three years. We
have really been looking at the piracy issue from a Somali viewpoint: the effects on land in
Somalia; the Somali community’s opinions on the piracy issue; and how that fits into the
global dialogue on piracy.
Dr Chitiyo: Thank you, Mr Chair. I am Knox Chitiyo. I am the Africa Fellow at Chatham
House. I also was the Africa Fellow and Head of Africa Programme at RUSI, so it is an
interesting mix for me. I have done work more on the African maritime security and African
maritime strategy. One of the projects we did when I was at RUSI was with the African
Union helping them to devise their maritime security strategy. We have worked on other
things as well in terms of maritime issues.
Dr Willett: Good morning, Mr Chairman. I am Dr Lee Willett and I am Senior Research
Fellow in Maritime Studies at RUSI. My particular area of focus on this subject—and
something that I think complements my two fellow witnesses—is I focus very much on the
international naval contribution, what that is and what more can be made of that. I hope that
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I will have something very complementary to add, in terms of the comprehensive approach
for dealing with this problem.
Q20 The Chairman: Good. Thank you very much. Perhaps I could start on a more
general level and ask whether the response of the international community to the problem
of piracy off the coast of Somalia, particularly by the EU, has been correctly focused and
effective. What has been the response of the Africans to the problems? How has this been
linked with the EU’s activity? What have the main achievements been so far and the
problems? It is really setting out the scene for the rest of the session. I do not know who
would like to take that first.
Dr Willett: Thank you. I will take the direction of my two colleagues and happily kick off on
that one, because I think it is a very interesting question. First of all, in terms of the response
of the international community, correctly focused and effective, I think there was a slight
degree of inevitability that the initial focus would be at sea and would be naval for two
reasons: one, because the pirate attacks were happening at sea; and, two, because the open
nature of the sea means that nations can park ships out there and try and do something
without having to get into the deeper political issue of thinking then about what to do
ashore. The very nature of the sea lent a naval response, in the first instance, as one of the
more straightforward options.
In terms of the effectiveness, I would say that, yes, it has been effective but with caveats. In
terms of how effective it has been, yes, the naval response has helped to contain the
problem. But it raises the question: for how long, because the nations have a finite amount of
naval resources to apply to this and a finite amount of political patience, so part of the
question that I would like to get into later is how to maintain that.
In terms of the focus, of course it has looked very much at the issue at sea. That is quite a
short-term approach in terms of the overall problem, so the caveat there, in terms of focus,
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is how to sustain that focus in the longer term and deal with the problem both at sea and
ashore.
Q21 The Chairman: I am very happy on this one to take people’s introductory remarks.
Dr Chitiyo.
Dr Chitiyo: If I may just add on to what Lee said. Overall, I think there has been a generally
positive evolution, particularly with regard to Operation Atalanta because it helped focus on
what was the key issue at the time, which was on anti-piracy. In that respect, there has
generally been good progress because when Operation Atalanta and the EU first came in, it
was a massive, massive problem. Now that Operation Atalanta has come in, there has been a
focus on specific anti-piracy operations and I think the operationalisation of it has helped to
curb piracy activities.
Where we are at now is a situation where, with the improved operational situation in
Somalia itself against al-Shabaab, what needs to happen now is to take the anti-piracy
operations to the next level. We are now in a situation where it has to become much more
comprehensive, where the land operations and the sea operations have to become much
more integrated, both in terms of Operation Atalanta and in terms of the wider
international or global approach. It has to be a comprehensive approach, not just in terms of
bringing more nations on board but also operationally.
Adjoa Anyimadu: I agree with what both my colleagues have said. Has the international
community been effective in countering piracy? Yes, if you are looking at the number of
successful hijackings that have happened recently. The numbers have definitely dropped in
the first quarter of 2012. But, as Lee said, it is important to see this in a wider context of
what is happening in Somalia, particularly the trajectory of piracy since the mid 2000s, which
is that pirates have proved themselves to be highly adaptable. Hijacking may have gone down
at sea this year, but there has also been evidence over the past year that pirates are acting
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more on land in terms of kidnapping aid workers and so on and tourists. It is important for
the international community to keep an eye on the fact that this trajectory is constantly
changing and that piracy may go on to evolve in a way that has not been predicted so far.
Q22 Lord Lamont of Lerwick: Could I ask just a factual question? Do you have a figure
for the total number of hostages held by pirates currently?
Adjoa Anyimadu: I hear estimates of between 150 and about 188.
Q23 Lord Lamont of Lerwick: Hostages?
Adjoa Anyimadu: Yes.
Dr Willett: There are seven ships currently held as I understand it.
Q24 Lord Lamont of Lerwick: I thought it was a higher figure, I must say.
Dr Willett: There have been some ships that have been released in recent weeks and
months following the payment of ransoms.
Dr Chitiyo: The general estimates are currently around 150 to 200.
Q25 The Chairman: Can I just ask one regional supplementary? We heard—as you
heard—from the Foreign Minister of the Seychelles about how this was affecting the region
economically. It is okay for us as trading nations to talk about the trade but it is having a real
effect on the regional economy. Is there real co-ordination of those littoral states in Africa
around this as well as all the interventions from the west? Is that actually happening or is that
a force? Are they talking together and working co-operatively?
Adjoa Anyimadu: I think it has been a lot slower than the Western approach to counter-
piracy. That is partly to do with the importance of the shipping industry to the West and the
fact that piracy was initially quite concentrated just off the coast of Somalia and in the Gulf of
Aden. As pirates have moved further south and into the Indian Ocean, increasingly the
eastern coastal states of Africa are being affected, in terms of both perception of risk for
investors into countries—I think that has really affected Kenya particularly—and also the
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tourism industry in Tanzania and Seychelles has been badly affected. Those aspects have
really encouraged states in the Indian Ocean, and along the east coast of Africa, to start
thinking about co-ordinating their efforts towards piracy. Around the London Conference
on Somalia I know there were talks among states, including Tanzania, South Africa and
Mozambique, to come up with an agreement to approach the counter-piracy effort in a co-
ordinated fashion.
Q26 The Chairman: Is that work in progress at the moment? It is not really happening
that strongly.
Adjoa Anyimadu: There were news reports that within the past month Tanzania, South
Africa and Mozambique have launched a successful counter-piracy operation and have
captured some pirates. That was with the support of the EU.
Q27 Lord Inge: You have partly answered the question I was going to ask. Therefore
would you say, as a result of the change in tactics by Atalanta and so on, that the piracy
problem has increased or decreased? Where do you think it has got to? Secondly—and again
you mentioned part of it—how good are the pirates at changing their tactics? What
capabilities do you think they are looking for to improve their operational capability?
Dr Willett: Taking the second question first, if I may, the pirates have proved to be
remarkably resilient, but one can argue it is because they have not had much opportunity to
do anything else. The key question here is to what extent you can consider that the piracy
model has been broken—where you cut off their sources of revenue, you cut off their ability
to operate. Over the course of time they have shown a remarkable ability to be able to
adapt: whether it is to increase the range of their operations as a result of the balloon effect,
whereby when you push down on their presence in one area it bulges up somewhere else,
which is what happened originally with the pressure in the Gulf of Aden from the naval
forces forcing the problem further out into the Somali Basin, almost as far out as the Indian
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coastline and into Indian waters; the use of mother ships, where they would use a larger
vessel from which to launch their skiffs at sea; and the use of greater levels of weaponry,
aggression and violence, which has been steadily increasing, and also, as mentioned, they
have been turning to kidnapping ashore and other things.
What we saw, in particular in 2011, was a surge in this ability to reach further out and to do
more with greater levels of violence. I would argue this is business from the pirates’ point of
view. While some may argue that in Somali terms perhaps life is cheap, and that they are not
perhaps necessarily that conscious of the fact that they may lose their lives over this, it is a
business model for them. If you cut off the source they are then going to try and find
something else to do.
In terms of your question about weapons and tactics, what has been interesting and has been
covered in a couple of press sources, following the initial attack onshore a couple of months
ago, was whether the pirates would now look again to up the ante in terms of responding to
a threat directly to them ashore. There were sources quoted in the press saying, “Well,
maybe the pirates will look into anti-air weapons?” because if they see that the threat will
come by helicopter from the sea over the beach then an air defence asset, from their point
of view, might be something that they would look at. Certainly, some press sources have
suggested that is a concern. Of course, history with Somalia and helicopters is a particularly
difficult one—not something that I am sure many nations would be interested in
entertaining.
But in terms of your first question, if I may respond, how Atalanta and the change in
mandate have worked, I think it has been a very important response from a military and a
political point of view. Militarily it is taking the fight to the pirates and it is trying to break the
model in terms of deconstructing their view that they are invulnerable ashore. It is not
targeting the pirates; it is targeting their skiffs, their fuel and their weapons dumps. The
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proportionality is very important as part of this response. The attacks take away the pirates’
ability to conduct piracy, targeting their assets on the beach where they felt they were
invulnerable ashore. It is also part of joining up the naval approach with other activities
ashore and more of a comprehensive approach to how you do this. It is very proactive and it
enables the navies to be more open in how they interpret their rules of engagement and so
on.
One of the key things though in this—and this relates to the problem of politics, and is
particularly relevant to the EU—is that when the issue of the mandate renewal was coming
up again, I think there was a desire from the navies and some of the nations to say, “We
have to be able to show that we can do more” because renewal is just going to be the same
old as we have done for the last four years. There might be a time when some nations say,
“Well, what are we achieving here?” Perhaps upping the ante was part of renewing the
effectiveness of the mandate and saying to the nations of the European Union, “We are
doing more. We can do more”. One of the risks in that, though, is conversely very strange,
in that if you show progress in breaking the piracy model and reducing the numbers of
attacks, at a time of austerity when there are other areas of interest for the European
nations, might people in the national capitals say, “Oh well, we have nipped that one in the
bud, so now we can go and worry about something else”. That is the danger because any
success achieved here is very easily reversible. One of the key challenges for all of this is
maintaining the political commitment and the political buy-in of the nations concerned.
Q28 Lord Inge: Is the political will still all right?
Dr Willett: At the moment I think so, and I think absolutely the change of the mandate was
fundamental in demonstrating that, because it showed that the navies concerned, and their
national capitals, were prepared to authorise an increased use of force and to entertain the
risks that that might bring with it, so I think so, yes.
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Q29 Lord Inge: If you covered that command in Atalanta, what capability would you like
to improve your effectiveness?
Dr Willett: One would suspect that a naval officer would always say that he could do with a
lot more of certain things. Maritime surveillance assets are particularly very, very important,
which relates to certain other debates in the UK about our capabilities, but other nations
are providing those—the Seychelles, the Italians, the Germans and others. The ability to
poise large ships offshore is a very interesting point about this. When you look at the Libya
crisis—it is slightly unrelated but it has an important link to this—there was evidence to
suggest that putting a large ship that has helicopters on deck offshore had a demonstrable
coercive effect on the regime fighters. There is an argument put forward in some of the
media coverage in the wake of the initial attack ashore in Somalia that the presence of a
French landing ship with attack helicopters could have had a similar deterrent effect on the
Somali pirates too, because you are talking about hard-end military capability that is parked
offshore that is very visible and can arrive very quickly. The question there is whether the
pirates will choose to melt into the background, as they did in that initial attack, or think
about striking back in due course to preserve their equipment.
The Chairman: I guess you cannot park it there for five years, which is a problem. Lord
Jay, you wanted to come in on this question.
Q30 Lord Jay of Ewelme: What did the pirates do before they were pirates and what
would they do if they could not be pirates anymore?
The Chairman: Stand for Parliament, I think.
Baroness Young of Hornsey: The new House of Lords.
The Chairman: A very good question.
Adjoa Anyimadu: I think there is a lot of talk, which in my own personal opinion is only
partly true now, that these pirates are former fishermen whose livelihoods have been ruined
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by illegal fishing by international fishing fleets, some of them European apparently, and also by
the alleged dumping of toxic waste off the coast of Somalia. There has never been any real
research done into whether this is true and, if it is true, what the effects are now currently. I
think as piracy has proved to be so lucrative for so many people, pirate networks have
increased and multiplied in their complexity. Thousands of people are involved in this issue
and not all of them could have been fishermen before they became pirates. Also important I
think is that a lot of the coastal communities are, we hear, not necessarily directly involved
in providing young men for the hijackings. We hear that a lot of these people are coming
inland from the larger towns, in Puntland particularly, and then heading to the coast to
conduct these attacks because it is lucrative.
Q31 The Chairman: Dr Chitiyo, I think you wanted to come back on the original
question?
Dr Chitiyo: Yes, if I can just add something on the question of the success or otherwise of
Operation Atalanta. It may be useful if we go back to the original mandate of Operation
Atalanta and to what extent that has been achieved. Part of the original mandate was
protection of World Food Programme ships from assault by pirates. That I think has been
very, very successful. There have been very few World Food Programme ships that have
been taken, so in that respect I think it has been very successful.
With the evolution of piracy and anti-piracy we are now in a situation where it is both a land
as well as a sea issue. One of the things I think for Operation Atalanta, an operational
question, will be: how do you target the pirate ships and the people on land? There is going
to be an aspect of human intelligence that I think needs to be beefed up—human intelligence
capabilities on the ground—to know who the pirates are, what they do when they are not
being pirates, where are they and so on. I think that needs to be improved. Also, there
needs to be an element of precision munitions or so on to take out their mother ships
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without inflicting civilian casualties. There is an issue there around precision weaponry
and/or special forces. I think there is a question mark there.
The Chairman: Thank you. Can I then move on to Lord Williams? I think we will come
back on to the World Food Programme.
Q32 Lord Williams of Elvel: Looking a bit at the longer run, do you think that the
international anti-piracy operations are sufficient to allow the shipping industry to continue
to use this particular route along the Gulf of Aden and so on? Secondly, do you think that
the industry itself is doing enough for its own protection? Should we have more armed
protection units on ships? Is the insurance industry doing more? We were very worried at
our last inquiry that the insurers took a very relaxed view about the whole business and
were quite prepared to insure ransoms, for instance. What is the situation there?
Dr Willett: Yes, of course the big change, at least in terms of the UK’s debate since you last
looked at this issue, is the UK Government’s decision to allow the companies that have UK-
flagged ships to authorise the use of armed security detachments on their vessels. The
problem there, of course, is that the naval forces that were present simply were not present
in sufficient numbers to enable every single ship to be covered, even if they were doing a
very good job at deterring attacks and starting to drive the number of successful attacks in a
downward direction. The problem with the naval ships is that if you think about the number
that you would actually need to provide coverage, based on being able to get a helicopter
over a ship being attacked within 20 minutes in the entire area in question, you will not ever
have enough ships. It is impossible. Given that you have to have one ship on station, one ship
prepared to relieve it and one ship having come off patrol, you are talking about hundreds of
ships that have to be in the cycle to maintain 60 or 70 on station to give you that coverage.
You would never have enough naval ships even in the most ideal naval world. There was
always going to be a feeling that there would be a need to find other means to provide a
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solution to this problem. Hence Governments are saying that perhaps armed guards are a
way forward.
Of course, the issue of armed guards has been very difficult politically. Some in the shipping
industry have been concerned that the Government is leaving the industry to its own fate.
Others have argued that, of course, the shipping industry should provide security for its
vessels in the same way it provides security for warehouses ashore. The debate has been
very mixed and very polemic, but what we do have is a situation now where it is happening
and companies are using it. They were before anyway in terms of some other nations.
Evidence suggests that it is having an effect on the pirates. It is having a deterrent effect,
simply because the chances of the pirates finding a ship now that does not have either a
naval ship nearby, or some kind of armed detachment on board, is decreasing to the point
that their window of opportunity to find a ship that is vulnerable is very small. Having said
that, there still needs to be a lot of discussion about how to work this properly. The use of
armed detachments is a very defensive measure, whereas the whole point of Atalanta’s
mandate is to be more offensive and proactive and to take the fight to the pirates.
In terms of the initial question about whether the route is still safe to use, shipping
companies have looked at rerouting round the Horn but that adds an awful lot of cost. At
the moment, most of them have opted to continue to carry on using the route and to rely
upon the protection of the naval forces and now of private security if they can.
Q33 Lord Williams of Elvel: Do you think this is a winnable campaign? Can you see into
the future and say sooner or later we are going to clean the whole thing up?
Dr Willett: There are two end states that we are talking about and they are different. There
is the end state at sea and the end state ashore. The end state at sea is to get the situation
back to what it was in 2005-06 where there was the risk or possibility of piracy as there is
anywhere in the world, but the seafarers using that particular part of the world were able to
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transit that region without feeling that their lives were inherently at risk just by doing that
job on a daily basis. If the numbers of attacks or the risk of attack can be reduced to a level
that is manageable for the industry and for the navies and manageable politically for the
Governments, then that is the sort of position that you are looking for as a solution at sea.
But that is a different question, though, from taking away the root causes of piracy ashore,
which of course is a much, much longer term question.
Dr Chitiyo: If I may just add on to what Lee is saying, the other thing that shipping
companies are doing to protect their ships is actually putting technology on the ships, such
as citadels and so on, so that even if the pirates do put their ladders up and manage to get to
the top, it is almost impossible for them to actually get into the ship. This, plus the use of
armed guards, has proved to be quite a useful deterrent. One caveat on that, though, is that
in some instances where pirates have managed to clamber on and take an armed ship, it has
led to greater attacks on the hostages. There is that unfortunate corollary.
For the international community and Africa, there are two levels in terms of the long term.
One is the aspirational, which is the eradication of piracy, which is what people talk about.
At a more pragmatic day-to-day level, as Lee said, it is to bring it down to a manageable level
and then work down from there. The long-term goal, as stated at political level, is the
eradication but everyone knows that is going to take time.
Q34 Lord Williams of Elvel: If I may very quickly, is there any shift in marine insurers’
attitude towards this whole business? We were very disappointed when we had them in
front of us when we did our last study. We thought they were insufficiently robust about
refusing to insure ships that did not obey the rules.
Adjoa Anyimadu: My point is related to your question, because I think it is important to
remember that there are always going to be irresponsible ship owners who do not really fall
under the cover of the organised and very vocal international shipping industry, and the
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prominent voices there. You see cases, such as the MV Iceberg, where insurance is
insufficient, the ship owners go bust and you end up with a vessel that is rapidly
deteriorating, being held in Somalia for over a year, and the hostages there are in a very bad
state. I believe two hostages in that situation have already died and there is no real clear plan
for how to get them out. There are always going to be gaps in the shipping industry, where it
is difficult to reach ship owners who are willing to take a risk to go along there without
proper protection in place.
In terms of the insurers, I think that the angle of the international community of looking
increasingly at ransom payments—and I think that has been really headed by the UK—has
partly made insurers more aware of their responsibilities and also of the political interest in
their activities. There was a suggestion that ransom payments could be banned, and the
effect that that would have on insurers and the shipping industry as a whole was really
strongly taken on by insurers and the shipping industry. There have been improvements, I
would say. There have been improvements.
Q35 Lord Jopling: Dr Willett, you said a few moments ago that you thought that the
existence of armed on-board protection units had been effective, but when you came before
this Committee two and a half years ago—and I am quoting question 185—you said, “One
could argue, I suppose, would that deter the pirates; well, the evidence at the moment
suggests not”. Could you tell us what might have happened in the mean time that has made
these on-board protection units effective, which you felt then were not?
Dr Willett: I think the issue at the time was the significant concern in the shipping industry,
perhaps not necessarily to do with the effectiveness, but there were two things. One, there
was a concern that at the time the pirates had shown a habit for just ratcheting up the
pressure all the time. The view was that, if you started putting weapons on board, the
weapons would just be used in defensive measures and the pirates would just continue to up
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the ante. What has happened since then is that, rather than just put forward the issue of
armed guards as a standalone solution, we have had a number of measures that have come
together, of which armed guards is one. Increasingly, the change of the mandate for Atalanta
is another one. There has been more of a comprehensive approach to looking at this, which
makes the armed guards option—I do not want to say less risky—perhaps more palatable. It
gives more utility if such things are done as part of a wider approach, where you can add
them in as an overall part of a comprehensive effort to deter the pirate threat, which does
not just rely upon the armed guards being given licence to do this but has the naval forces
and the Governments doing more as part of a comprehensive approach.
To add into your question and build on something that Dr Chitiyo raised, there was the
issue of best management practice, which means encouraging the ship owners themselves
not only to consider things like armed guards but to consider making the ships secure in the
first place. There is a well written and publicly available best management practice document
that is given to all ship owners and ship masters. They are all encouraged to take it on board.
It is very slim, it is simple to read and it is delivered in a very commonsense way. If you can
get your ship owners to encourage all of their ships to use that, that again is another key
part of this overall package that has come together, since two years ago, to create a broader
approach.
The problem about BMP, as both my fellow panellists have raised, is that there are still
some—a quarter or more—who do not do it. It is encouraging those ship owners and those
ship masters to do that as part of the approach. When you have armed guards on board, the
pirates may be deterred by that but they are similarly deterred by a ship that is driving at
speed, that is using evasive manoeuvring and that has a citadel and razor wire as part of a
package.
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Of course, the overall approach—linking a point to the original question—is that, when you
are trying to look at this holistically, best management practice is something that all ship
owners around the world need to be responsible for implementing, no matter what part of
the world they are operating in, because it is just about making shipping safer, whether the
threat is from East Africa or West Africa or in the South China Sea. Unfortunately, it is a
cost to ship owners as well to do this, particularly when you are talking about the Somali
Basin area, and when you are putting in citadels and razor wire that is a further cost. You
have to try and make the case to the ship owners that they need to think about this for their
overall fleets and not just for the ships that transit that particular area.
Q36 The Chairman: We need to move on, but can I just capture one statistic? I think
you mentioned 25% as your estimate of ship owners that effectively just do it as they have
always done it. Is that what you are saying?
Dr Willett: The generally accepted or generally discussed figure is that about a quarter of
the ships that are involved choose—either because they do not wish to or because they
cannot afford to—not to implement best management practice.
Q37 Lord Lamont of Lerwick: My written down question was: how effective is the
Transitional Federal Government in addressing the root causes of the problem? But I think
Adjoa has already talked about the fishing industry, the huge fortunes and the drive for
celebrity. Maybe it is a bit unreasonable, really, to expect the Government to be able to do
that much about these root causes. Maybe the answer is, as Lord Williams was saying, this is
just containment of the problem.
Adjoa Anyimadu: As both my colleagues have said, realistically containment is what we
should aim for at the moment. The added problem of expecting the TFG particularly to have
an effect on mitigating piracy is the fact that it does not really occur in the areas under TFG
control. The TFG basically controls Mogadishu, the capital city of Somalia, and not much else
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at the moment. Piracy attacks tend to happen off the coast of Puntland, so slightly further
north, and that region has a semi-autonomous Government. I feel that the one sticking point
has been the political focus on supporting the TFG, and it is understandable because it is the
internationally recognised Government of Somalia. Puntland has declared itself autonomous
but also sees itself as part of a federated Somalia in the future sense. When Somalia is fixed
they will want to be a part of that Somalia, but for the moment want to govern themselves.
The difficulty there is that it means that international Governments have to tread carefully
when engaging with Puntland, because being seen to recognise them to a greater extent or
engaging more with them than the TFG may be seen to be recognising them over the TFG.
However it is necessary, as I have said, because that is where piracy is occurring most. I
think there has been a change in attitude but it has been gradual. It needs to be a lot more
proactive and a lot quicker in order to combat piracy from where it is happening in Somalia.
Q38 Lord Lamont of Lerwick: But these problems are so profound it would be difficult
to believe anyone could make a lot of progress on the actual root causes. To what extent
have the efforts to enhance the capacity to prosecute pirates in Somalia, Somaliland and
Puntland been effective?
Adjoa Anyimadu: I think the comments you heard from the Foreign Minister of the
Seychelles this morning touched a lot on this. The Seychelles really has been at the forefront
of prosecuting pirates, as has Kenya, but Kenya has very complicated political issues with
Somalia. I think this makes the notion of keeping Somali nationals in prison for piracy - for an
offence that has not affected Kenya - is hard to justify to the Kenyan population because of
the expense. The transfer of pirates to prisons in Somalia has picked up, I think in Somaliland
particularly because of its relative stability compared to the rest of Somalia. That has been
successful. In Puntland the UNODC is putting in a lot of money and is supported by a
number of EU member states to increase the judicial capacity. But there are concerns. We
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hear from some people that the potential of links between some authorities in Puntland and
pirate networks make the idea of keeping pirates in Puntland not entirely palatable at the
moment.
Dr Chitiyo: Just a tiny note to add on to what Adjoa was saying, particularly with regard to
Puntland, the suggestion with regard to prosecution and incarceration of pirates was
probably better last year than this. I think there has been a bit of a slowdown this year,
partly because of the transition occurring in Somalia itself, partly because of issues between
Puntland and Somalia. Overall there needs to be a higher and quicker re-engagement with
Puntland on the whole question of what do we do about pirates, because I think there has
been a definite slowdown in Puntland in particular.
Dr Willett: Let me make a very small, quick point on this. In terms of the overall approach
of deterring attacks but particularly of keeping the Somali populace on side, one particular
issue that is quite interesting in terms of the judicial process and imprisonment is that some
estimate that as many as 2,000 pirates are currently awaiting trial in a number of countries.
From a Somali populace point of view that is quite an interesting message, because if we are
trying to show to the Somalis themselves that allowing piracy to happen from within their
country is not the right thing to do, to keep the population on side and to encourage them
to drive out the pirates, which is something that has happened on a number of occasions in
certain towns like Eyl, for example, getting the message across somehow to the Somali
population that, “Actually what you are talking about here is an entire generation of your
young men—and occasionally young women now—being removed and being put in prison
for a long time, with life imprisonment being the sentence in some cases”. If 2,000 young
men are suddenly taken away, that has an impact locally in terms of the ability of the Somali
population to do what it needs to do. Putting the message across that, “The imprisonment is
going to work and it is, if they keep conducting piracy, going to take away a generation of
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your young men”, is an important message that some argue would have an effect if it was put
across.
Q39 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: I think you have covered quite a lot of
what I was going to ask. That is a very good aspiration, but what about the practicalities of
it? We just heard from the Foreign Minister of the Seychelles that they do not want to keep
these pirates in prisons on the Seychelles, so where are they going to be incarcerated?
Adjoa Anyimadu: I think the UNODC has made quite sterling moves to increase the
capacity in Somaliland and Puntland. For African regional states especially, the idea of being
able to transfer pirates, once they are prosecuted, back to Somalia means that prosecutions
are more likely to happen in those states because authorities know that they are not going
to have to look after the pirates.
Q40 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: No, I see that. But you just said a
moment ago that there were problems with the connection between pirates and the prisons
in Puntland. Picking up on what Lord Jopling said in the last session, how do you ensure that
the pirates are not just sprung from the prisons once they are sent back to Somalia,
whichever bit?
Adjoa Anyimadu: It is a combination of things. It includes what Lee has said, about
increasing the awareness of the population in those regions of the impact that piracy is
having on them. Particularly around the time of the London Conference on Somalia, we
heard a lot of calls from the Somali community that piracy is not particularly a burning issue
for Somali people, because it is seen to affect the international shipping industry and
Western Governments, and there are so many other problems on the ground in Somalia,
such as food insecurity, al Shabaab and the lack of representative governance. But if Somalis
were encouraged to see that piracy does affect them, then that will have an impact on the
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pressure put on the judicial system within Somalia to ensure that incarceration really does
mean incarceration.
Q41 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: But who is actually running these
prisons?
Adjoa Anyimadu: It is a mixture. I know in Puntland the Puntland authorities are taking an
increasingly proactive role and seeking international partners to help with the judicial system
and with the prison system. As I said, the UNODC has taken a lead role and a number of EU
member states are also providing money for prisons.
Q42 The Chairman: You mentioned it on the EU side. Do you feel the EU should get
more involved in this particular area perhaps?
Adjoa Anyimadu: As far as I know, a number of EU member states are supporting these
efforts. I think that there needs to be is more of a comprehensive approach, more of a link
between the focus of breaking up the operational methods of piracy, efforts on the judicial
side and on tracking the financial flows of piracy. There needs to be a more cohesive
approach.
Q43 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: Just picking up on the EU point, is it true
that the EU Development Fund cannot be used to build prisons?
Adjoa Anyimadu: I am not entirely sure. As far as I know, the EU Development Fund is
supposed to go towards more general support.
The Chairman: We have to redefine it as housing accommodation, I suspect.
Dr Chitiyo: One key thing that needs to happen is there has to be a deeper and wider
dialogue between the EU and IGAD. That is the East African community. IGAD also is
developing a strategy and prosecution of pirates is one of the issues. Of course, IGAD is
partly with AMISOM and so on. I think that dialogue needs to be deepened as quickly as
possible.
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The Chairman: We sometimes tend to forget about IGAD, you are right.
Q44 Lord Jopling: The Foreign Minister—whom we saw an hour ago—told us that the
UN were running the prisons in Somalia and that he was not sure whether they were armed
or not. Can you confirm both those things?
Adjoa Anyimadu: I am not sure on the ground of exactly what the UN’s day-to-day capacity
is in terms of being armed. I am not sure, but that is something that I can check.
Dr Chitiyo: The EU is running prisons in Somalia. At the moment, as we speak, they are not
armed as such.
Lord Jopling: The EU you said?
Dr Chitiyo: No, the UN.
Lord Jopling: Sorry, I thought you said EU.
Dr Chitiyo: No, the UN is running the prisons.
Q45 Lord Jopling: But not armed?
Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: Running all of it?
Dr Chitiyo: Not all the prisons, but the majority of them. At the moment they are not
armed, but one of the ongoing discussions is whether and to what extent they should be
armed. The reason for lack of arms is a political issue with regard to Somalia.
Q46 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: When you say “running all the prisons”,
are these pirate prisons?
Dr Chitiyo: Yes, the pirate prisons, but they are not running all the prisons. They are
running most of them.
The Chairman: As you can see there is a lot of interest in this particular area, because one
of the things as a Committee we try to be is very practical around solutions. As Kathryn, our
clerk, mentioned to you beforehand, if you wanted to provide any further evidence for us
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around this that you think we would find useful in terms of facts or this area, I am sure we
would welcome that after today’s session.
Q47 Lord Radice: There has been talk of better co-ordination not just between EU
countries but between the EU and the United States, of course, and also China and India. I
am just interested in the Chinese. Do they have a different approach to the pirates than the
others? It is rumoured that they do and I wonder if you could help us here.
Dr Willett: It is an interesting question. When you look at the Chinese approach to dealing
with the problem, you have to look at the Chinese approach to their presence in global
affairs as a whole. For example, I raise that with regard to the Chinese offer to help to do
World Food Programme escorts at the moment. One can argue that this is the Chinese
trying to convey a message that they are doing good things for the people of the region. Of
course, as a growing global power with a blue water navy, their desire to be there in all of
the areas of major activity from a naval point of view is a key part of their overall strategy of
projecting Chinese power around the world. They have interests they seek to protect in
those parts of the world as well. As a minor aside, looking at the Chinese presence in the
Indian Ocean, you can look at their developing links in Djibouti, in Pakistan and in Sri Lanka
and Burma, which give them quite an interesting little strategic foothold over the entire
region. Of course, that raises the question of what the Indians might think about that. There
is a whole wider dynamic of power politics in the Indian Ocean area, of which the Chinese
are a major part.
In terms of the particular piracy issue and where that fits in, of course, the Chinese, seeing
themselves as a major world power and a world navy, want to play a very particular part in
that. So, understandably, they put themselves forward, and I think they are now on their
11th rotation of ships on task. They were very concerned when they first started out they
would not be able to sustain that, but they have found they need to keep going and to keep
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being involved and they have done that now. Actually, the more they have done it, the more
their contribution has been welcomed. Going back to my original point about navies do what
navies do and they co-operate at sea because you can, the Chinese found very quickly that
rather than go and just do their own thing about piracy and escort their own ships, they very
quickly recognised the need to get involved and help other ships.
For example, if there was a ship that was in distress or under attack and their ship was the
nearest ship, they went and did it even if it was not a Chinese merchant ship that was being
attacked. They very quickly realised that when their ships ran out of supplies at sea, the
easiest thing is to get on the nearest ship, even if it is an American or British ship, and just
ask for help because it is what navies do. There is the big strategic power politics issue with
China, which is creating an interesting message about their presence and what they are
trying to do, but within that there is the reality of the fact that they are there, they are doing
it and they are making a useful contribution.
Q48 Lord Radice: On tactics, are they any different?
Dr Willett: That I am not entirely sure of, to be honest. They seem to be following the rules
of engagement in the same way as others. There are other nations that perhaps are being
slightly less strict. In my view, the Chinese do not have a name that normally comes up
among those that are doing their own thing.
Lord Radice: In a sense, that is a very useful corrective to the general view.
The Chairman: I think you were going to ask on the AMISOM question—
Lord Radice: Well, no, I thought I was asking about China, actually.
The Chairman: We thought you would maybe combine the two somehow.
Lord Radice: Would you like to ask that question?
Q49 The Chairman: Do not worry, I will move it on. Yes. We talked a little bit about
AMISOM and I suppose this comes back also to Africa’s own response to the regional crisis.
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“EU support for AMISOM gives grounds for an even more pessimistic assessment, in
comparison to the EU’s support for the AU Mission in Sudan”. That was stated by Alex
Vines of Chatham House. “Despite the importance of Somalia for European security, the
assistance provided has been half-hearted.” Do you agree with his assessment? It is really
about the effectiveness of AMISOM. In Europe can we help that be more effective, or should
we just keep out of that and let Africa sort that out for itself?
Dr Chitiyo: What we have all seen has been a massive change in the last six months in the
situation on the ground in Somalia with AMISOM. A year ago it was a very difficult situation
with al-Shabaab pretty much in control of south central and pretty much half of Mogadishu.
In the past six months that situation has changed dramatically with AMISOM and the Somali
security forces. We should not forget that there are now the national forces of Somalia as
well. They have taken Mogadishu and they are moving into the former al-Shabaab area.
There has been a massive change; I think a very positive change. AMISOM in a way is on a
roll. How long that will last remains to be seen, but certainly al-Shabaab is on the back foot.
There is no doubt about it. AMISOM does need to be given support. The talk in Somalia
now is about building a nation and this is something that is pretty much unheard of.
The Chairman: That is very important—
Dr Chitiyo: The Somali people themselves are talking about building a nation, so there is a
general spirit of optimism. There are challenges also, but the Somalis themselves speak in a
general spirit of optimism together with AMISOM. The AMISOM mission should be
supported. I do not see it now as being as pessimistic as it was even six months ago.
Q50 Lord Radice: Can I just follow that up? We are talking about the Ethiopian troops
and the Kenyan troops above all. Which is the more effective of those two efforts?
Dr Chitiyo: There are the Ethiopians and Kenyans, but there are also the Ugandan Djibouti
forces. It is a mix. I think they are all generally professional forces. One of the important
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changes that has occurred, particularly with regard to the Ethiopians, is that while the
Somalians are still very wary about Ethiopians in Somalia, it is much less hostile now than it
was, say, in 2006 when the Ethiopians last went in. That level of hostility is somewhat
diminished, but overall I think these are very competent troops. There is less general
hostility towards AMISOM now than there was perhaps a year ago, when I think civilians in
Mogadishu were very unhappy about the shelling by AMISOM forces in Mogadishu and so
on. There is a gradual increasing rapport between AMISOM and the Somali people, who are
now I think a little more accepting of the AMISOM mission in Somalia.
Adjoa Anyimadu: I think it is important to note that the Ethiopian troops in Somalia are not
under the AMISOM mandate. All of the other troops, as far as I know, are. Kenya initially
went into Somalia at the end of last year independently of AMISOM and has been
incorporated into AMISOM since then.
Q51 Lord Radice: Has that been in response to the kidnappings?
Adjoa Anyimadu: In response to the kidnappings and general insecurity in the southern
border of Somalia and northern border of Kenya.
Q52 The Chairman: Thank you. I am just seeing here whether we move on. Is the
Ugandan training mission, which is one of the EU missions there that is based in Uganda,
seen as something that is significant or successful, or is it just a pinprick that is seen as being
notional?
Dr Chitiyo: It is generally regarded as being very useful because it has helped to train not
just Ugandans but also the Somali national forces. I think it has been perceived as being very
useful.
Q53 The Chairman: Has that been a part of that greater confidence and ability of the
Somali national forces? Has that been directly attributed to that?
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Dr Chitiyo: It has had a direct impact on the greater professionalisation of the Somali
forces.
Q54 Lord Jay of Ewelme: One of the documents we were given was a document from
the Brenthurst Foundation, a discussion paper, “Somalia 2012: Ending the Transition?”, which
says at one point, “It is felt that foreign training methods in the EU-led training programmes
in Uganda has not been attuned to Somali needs and are seen as incongruent with Somali
approaches”. I just wonder whether you are taking a different view. That I thought was
rather surprisingly critical of the EU approach. It would be interesting to hear your
testament on that.
Dr Chitiyo: If I may on that, I think there has been an evolution on the EU Uganda training
mission. When it first began, it started at a time when there was a great level of hostility
within Somalia to outsiders coming in and trying to talk about Somalia. I think one of the
things that has happened has been that over the past two years it has been shown that the
training mission is there to help the Somali military and the Somali military in turn has
become more professional. They have become less aggressive towards their own civilians, so
there has been a transition. At the time that the survey was done, it was a very fractious
situation between Somali civilians, the Somali military and the EU military as well. That
situation has changed quite dramatically through dialogue. In a sense, the military success has
bred greater confidence.
The Chairman: We have to start moving through fairly quickly.
Q55 Lord Jopling: Yes. We saw in May a major escalation in this whole operation with
attacks on pirate facilities on land. I wonder if you could tell us whether this caused any
tensions within the alliance. What do you think is the major long-term effect of starting to
attack land targets? Do you have any information about the three drones that are kept on
Seychelles? Do they have a capacity not just to survey but also to launch rocketry or laser-
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guided missiles or are they just for reconnaissance? Would they have a role, if they could
launch missiles, in attacking land targets?
Dr Chitiyo: If I may I will perhaps just kick off and my colleagues will chip in. The question of
the shift, or the addition of adding land-based targets, has been acceptable and co-ordinated
at a political level with the TFG, with the region and with the EU. I think that has been
generally acceptable. The problem has been in how the civilian communities perceive the
land attacks and also Puntland, because I think just fairly recently there was an attack in
Gomba in Puntland. The Minister for marines in Puntland was very vociferous about the lack
of information from the EU with regard to this attack. He said Puntland was not informed or
consulted, and the attack simply occurred—a helicopter attack on pirate operations. I think
that is one thing that perhaps needs to be examined, which we alluded to earlier. There
needs to be discussions with Puntland. Again, on the civilian aspect, there perhaps needs to
be greater clarity from the EU and Operation Atalanta in terms of these attacks on the
ground. Are we talking about combat boots on the ground or simply essentially attacks using
helicopters? Because with the people of Somalia in particular it is an issue, I think perhaps
greater clarity needs to occur with regard to that particular question. I think my colleagues
probably have more to add.
Q56 The Chairman: Could we have brief comments, particularly the one perhaps also
on the capability of the drones, if we know what those are?
Dr Willett: Off the top of my head I do not, but it is something I can check up on and come
back on. There is, of course, a significant ethical discussion about using unmanned vehicles
for combat operations, which is a very vibrant issue in its own right, not just in Somalia but
elsewhere.
There are a couple of points which should be made about the mandate change and what it
means for the longer term is that. First of all, it is part of an acceptance politically that more
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needed to be done, yet there remains a very clear limit as to what can be done. As I
mentioned before, the proportionality is still very, very much in mind and the need to inflict
no casualties in such operations, even among the pirates, is at the forefront of the thinking
to ensure that one does not risk turning the Somali populace against the idea. The recent
attacks were very carefully targeted at skiffs themselves in particular, at refuelling points, at
weapons dumps et cetera. The mandate says very clearly that it extends to the shore and
some riverine areas, but nothing further. NATO has been taking a similar approach, too.
Although not striking ashore, it has been putting further pressure on the pirates as they
leave the beach, so blockading, effectively. This is seen as a step up. Whether or not there
has been any discussion of whether there needs to be any further steps I could not say
because the mandate change is seen itself as quite a big step because the navies are now
actually operating over the shore. The interesting point about the whole EU approach and
the EU mandate is that, while there are challenges in getting 27 nations to agree, the fact
that the EU operation as a whole, from the naval point of view, constitutes a number of
different components and the attacks ashore means that the nations can choose which bits
they want to support, so there is a degree of flexibility within the construct. Of course it is
interesting that there were seven nations involved in the original strike, back in May, which
suggests that at least a core of them are prepared to conduct attacks ashore and have the
ability, within their own national rules of engagement, to be able to interpret the rules and
to do it and to—
Q57 The Chairman: Can I ask which nations were involved?
Dr Willett: The nations that were involved—excuse me, I am just checking—were the
French, the Germans, the Italians, the Spanish, the Dutch and the Portuguese. The UK did
not have a ship there at the time.
Q58 The Chairman: It is a very interesting list, particularly the German side.
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Dr Willett: To be clear, those are the ships that were involved but none of the reports
made available state which ships launched helicopters. They say the helicopters came from
unnamed ships, so we know which ships were present but we do not know which ships
launched the helicopters that conducted the attack.
The Chairman: That is an important point that we will record. We have three more
questions. Because we have another session we are going to have to start, perhaps I could
ask each of my colleagues to ask a shortened version of the question and I could ask one of
you to reply with a quick answer on those questions, if you would not mind.
Q59 Baroness Henig: My problem is about the level of co-ordination between the EU’s
different elements, the naval force Atalanta, the training mission in Somalia and EUCAP
Nestor. In particular, I want to ask how the EUCAP Nestor initiative is progressing and
whether the timetables are going to be reached in terms of making that effective.
Dr Willett: That might be something I would be more comfortable giving you a further note
on when I have had a chance to have a look at it.
The Chairman: We welcome that very much indeed.
Q60 Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: What about the wider EU policy on the Horn of
Africa? Is it proving successful? Is the appointment of the special representative helpful and is
the European External Action Service causing any problems in relation to that?
Dr Chitiyo: From what I have seen—and I have been fairly frequently to the EU
headquarters in Addis—it is working pretty well. There are always certain tensions and so
on, but I think there is a general acceptance and, in fact, a welcoming of EU operations and
having the special representative there. I think it has made quite a vast difference to how the
EU is perceived. There is political acceptance of the need for co-ordination and partnership
with the EU. So I think it has been pretty successful.
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One thing that I might add, which is not specific to this question but just one of the things
occurring in the discussion in Africa itself, is that this is not simply about anti-piracy or
piracy per se, even within Somalia itself. That is something we need to take cognisance of.
Q61 Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: Is it going back to what Lord Jay was asking about the
root causes of this?
Dr Chitiyo: It is not simply the root causes because the regions—the African Union and so
on—are looking at the issue of maritime security in a wider context. One of the things that
they are looking at, with regard to Somalia as well, are things like port security. It is not
simply about piracy and anti-piracy. That is important, but I think further down the line we
need to think in a more holistic way in our dialogue with the EU and particularly with IGAD.
I also heartily recommend that we upscale the dialogue with IGAD.
Q62 Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: The dialogue with whom?
Dr Chitiyo: IGAD is the Intergovernmental Authority on Development in East Africa, which
is becoming one of the lead actors.
The Chairman: That is a prompt. Somewhere in this we need to get some evidence from
IGAD because they also appear in our Sudanese interests as well. Lastly, we have a record of
marginalising development issues to the end, I am afraid, and we have managed to do it again.
Baroness Young perhaps you would like to quickly—
Q63 Baroness Young of Hornsey: I will. Again, perhaps if you have anything further to
add on this, you can write us a note. What do you feel have been the main achievements of
the EU’s development and humanitarian aid programme in Somalia? How has EU funding for
the fishing industry helped the coastal communities in particular? How well is the EU co-
ordinating with the United Nations Development Programme rule of law and security
programme in terms of creating support for police forces, courts and prisons?
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Adjoa Anyimadu: These are all very good questions and quite big ones. What is good about
the EU’s Horn of Africa strategy is that it is explicitly supposed to be a holistic approach to
Somalia. So it is seeing piracy as one symptom of—what has been mentioned a few times
today—the root problems in Somalia, which are the political instability and the lack of
effective governance. The Horn of Africa strategy does emphasise the importance of
development, as well as governance, judicial reform and all of these aspects.
By co-ordinating better with the UN particularly, which I think is probably the only other
actor that is taking as holistic an approach as the EU, positive effects will be seen gradually
over a period of time. The actions that the EU is taking in coastal communities—actually, a
number of actors are engaged positively in coastal communities—seek to make piracy seem
unattractive, for example, through radio programmes and so on. They are engaging former
pirates and former pirate negotiators and have campaigns to show that piracy does not pay
and there is this risk of incarceration thousands of miles away from your family for an
indeterminate amount of time. I am sure they are having small effects on the ground but
those are so difficult to quantify. Overall, what is important for the EU’s strategy in the Horn
of Africa is to understand that often the positive effects of these things cannot be quantified
necessarily, but by talking to Somalis you can find out what the effects are that are happening
on the ground. I think that is important.
The Chairman: We would be very pleased to take more written evidence from you on
this particular question. I am sorry we have gone through the last part of this very quickly.
We would have been delighted to talk for at least another hour with you, I am sure. Thank
you very much indeed for the insights you have given us. We do treat this issue in this part
of the world extremely importantly. I am pleased to hear that some of the EU initiatives that
have taken place, which we scrutinise particularly, appear to be operating very positively,
although there is still a lot to learn and a lot to do. Thank you very much.
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Evidence to be found under Anyimadu
Chamber of Shipping - Written evidence
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Chamber of Shipping1 - Written evidence
What has changed since publication of the report in April 2010
1. The factors surrounding Somali piracy and what is often described as the Somali
Piracy Model constitute a unique international piracy phenomenon which, as
predicted is proving very difficult to counter. Piracy challenges the international
order and primarily must be a matter for Governments and the international
community to address.
2. In November 2011 the UK Government published Interim Guidance to UK
Flagged Shipping on the Use of Armed Guards to Defend against the Threat of
Piracy in exceptional Circumstances. The Guidance was updated in June 2012.
The shipping industry fully supports the guidance and sees the temporary use of
armed guards as an exceptional requirement at the present time. There is
concern that their use may become institutionalised, and is accepted by some in
Government as constituting the ‘new order’. The industry strongly challenges
and refutes this view.
3. UK government actions, including ministerial responses, to the Somali problem
have been positive and prompt. A clear FCO lead was established from the
start and good cross-departmental dialogue and co-ordination of policy has
been a notable feature. Close liaison with industry and effective civil/military
operational links continue to be maintained.
4. The human cost of piracy is appalling in scale and effect on individuals, 555
seafarers were attacked and taken hostage in 2011, 149 have been held for
more than a year and 35 lost their lives. Although fewer hostages were
captured in 2011 from the peak in 2010 the violence faced by seafarers has not
subsided. The worse affects of piracy on UK ships and seafarers has, by
comparison, been limited and it is notable that only 7% of hostages have been
from OECD countries.
5. Both as an island and a maritime trading nation the UK remains exposed to the
risks of piracy owing to the high levels of essential imports of all types, including
energy cargoes, which transit the High Risk Area through the Gulf of Aden and
across the Indian Ocean. In March 2011, an impact study jointly commissioned
by the Chamber and the Oil Companies International Marine Forum (OCIMF)
to quantify the economic impacts of Somali piracy highlighted the UK’s
particular dependence and exposure to piracy. It found that the value of EU
cargoes trading through the affected area exceeded $1,000 billion in 2009. The
UK should maintain a policy lead.
1 The Chamber of Shipping is the trade association for the UK shipping industry with 137 members; it
represents 927 ships of 28 million gross tonnes.
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6. The shipping industry believes the conduct of Operation Atalanta has been
methodical and determined – and its leadership highly effective. The shipping
industry has placed on record in different fora on several occasions its
appreciation for what has been delivered and achieved by the military.
7. The industry accepts there are no easy or short-term solutions to the threat
posed by Somali pirates. We continue to be fully engaged in many strands of
activity. The most obvious objectives are to:
Optimise vessel self-protection measures by implementation of Best
Management Practices (BMPs – Version4).
Address the concerns and confidence of seafarers and to reduce the
risks to which they are exposed.
Ensure an effective regime including third party accreditation and
international standards for Private Maritime Security Companies and
their personnel.
Support regional jurisdictional efforts and encourage UK prosecutions in
cases with sufficient UK interest.
Support international, regional and national capacity-building.
Defeat the UK’s political initiative which threatens the safety of our
employees by seeking to ban the payment of ransoms.
Establish a road map leading to a return to normality in the Indian
Ocean.
Operational Aspects of counter-piracy
8. Operationally, the industry-led Best Management Practices (BMPs) have proved
to be effective in preventing successful attacks, but non-compliance with BMPs
by a proportion, about 30%, of the (non UK) world’s fleet continues to be a
problem.
9. The introduction of Privately Contracted Armed Security Personnel (PCASP) or
Armed Guards on UK ships was initially resisted by UK shipping companies due
to the difficulties foreseen with legal, liability and safety aspects of their
employment, and the presence of weapons onboard civilian ships. Industry also
took the view in 2010 that the use of firearms by civilians in self-defence could
lead to an escalation in the use of firearms and other types of violence by
pirates. There has been no evidence of an escalation to date.
10. Detailed national guidance has now been produced with industry input and
arrangements for the third party accreditation of private security to
internationally agreed standards are expected to be introduced by the end of
2012. The industry believes this to be a pragmatic regulatory regime for UK to
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ensure private security companies and individuals working in the maritime
domain operate to the highest standards. However it is important to stress that
the use of PCASP is seen as a temporary and exceptional measure. It is not
legal or readily accepted in the jurisdictions of many third States and their use is
clearly not appropriate in response to other security threats or in other piracy
prone areas. In a global context the shipping industry remains concerned that
standards of PCASP may vary widely and a proportion of security companies
may not be complying with the established Rules for the use of Force, training
and safety requirements or the export and import and licensing requirements
for their firearms and ammunition. The shipping industry wants to remove the
need for the carriage of PCASP on civilian ships at the earliest opportunity.
11. The industry recognises the effectiveness of Armed Guards and the success of
the commercial model of PCASP which has been demonstrated in recent
months by the professionalism of those operating in the Indian Ocean and the
diligence of those shipping companies contracting them. Nevertheless, the
industry views with some disappointment the MOD’s decision not to resource
Vessel Protection Detachments (VPDs) consisting of military personnel; we
believe MOD has missed an opportunity to better contribute to the ‘protection
of merchant shipping’ which is still thought to be a core responsibility of
Governments and their navies. To contradict evidence given to the Committee
by MOD it is understood that a small number of highly trained UK VPDs
already exist to serve the self-protection needs of MOD cargoes being carried
on civilian ships and it is the view of the industry that their number and use
could have been extended, relatively cheaply and quickly, to serve a small
number of UK companies and their vessels. VPDs have crown immunity and so
are able to act with clear legitimacy in the counter-piracy environment; as yet
the same cannot be said for many of their privately contracted equivalents.
12. Chamber members have observed that the Royal Navy’s contribution of
warships to EUNAVFOR has been limited to a frigate or destroyer which
according to the Armed Forces Minister in his evidence to the Committee on
14 June is ‘one vessel for three months in every two years’. This is a minimal
contribution to force levels and is considerably less than is required by UK
shipping in the area and compares poorly with that made by other European
navies such as Spain, France, Germany (or Denmark, although not strictly part
of EUNAVFOR). The contribution of RFA and specialised units is acknowledged
but the UK contribution of ‘ship days’ to counter-piracy is less than many other
nations and less than that needed. The provision of the resource at EUNAVFOR
HQ should not preclude or justify the lack of warships deployed and
contributing to counter-piracy operations. The shipping industry in its evidence
in 2010 drew attention to the need for the RN to consider whether their
proposed ‘fleet profile’ provided sufficient lower cost patrol type vessels to be
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available for future global maritime security duties. Experience since 2010
indicates they may not.
Legal aspects and the payment of ransoms
13. The Chamber has strongly advocated the prosecution of captured pirates but
has recognised the legal complexities. Were sufficient ‘British interests’ present
in a piracy incident in the future, the Chamber would want to see pirates either
fast-tracked for prosecution in East Africa or regionally or brought home to be
prosecuted in UK.
14. The first meeting of the UK led International Task Force on Ransoms met 30
May 2012. Industry has a clear view supported by many in Government that
ransoms must be paid in order, however unpalatable it may be, to secure the
freedom of hostage seafarers, ships and cargoes; at the same time it
acknowledges ransom payments fuel the piracy model and allow the crime of
piracy to be seen to pay. The Chamber remains closely involved in this difficult
debate and is resisting any moves to ban ransom payments which, if
implemented, it believes would be unevenly applied, impossible to enforce and
further threaten and increase the risk to the lives of seafarers held hostage.
Conclusion
15. The EU military operation Operation Atalanta has been effective and has
reduced the number of pirate attacks from peak levels but the threat has been
diffused over a greater sea area. Many pirate attacks have been disrupted.
Strikes against pirate logistics are seen as being particularly effective. It is
recognised that the timescale of returning this vitally important but immense
sea area to normality is stretching out into the future. Existing EU force levels
must be maintained and the UK contribution increased. The Chamber
supports capacity building and continues to improve its own performance with
BMPs and the effectiveness and reliability of PCASP. Suggested areas for
Government attention are provided in the text of this submission.
28 June 2012
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Council of Somali Organisations - Written evidence
1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 We welcome this opportunity to submit evidence to the committee. The substance of
the Committees deliberations, are of substantial topical interest to the UKs large Somali
diaspora, who remain fully seized of the issues arising.
1.2 The Council of Somali Organisations on behalf of Somalis universally condemns maritime
piracy in the strongest possible terms. The Council of Somali Organisations calls for the
immediate and conditional release of all seafarers and other hostages held by pirate groups,
and other criminal networks.
1.3 In combating piracy, the Council of Somali Organisations urges the international
community to address the root causes of insecurity in Somali coastal regions, and to ensure
that the rule of law and universal human rights are observed in all aspects of detention,
prosecution and incarceration.
1.4 The Right to a fair trial and the particular vulnerabilities of minors prosecuted for alleged
piracy is of paramount importance in promoting the rule of law in the region.
The Committee is to be strongly commended for welcoming the present submissions.
1.5 It is in many ways unfortunate ,that that the international community has often excluded
the voices of Somalis themselves in discussions and decision making on all aspects of the
piracy conundrum, including the role of Somali authorities.
1.6 The popular view of Somalis universally is that the TFG is a creature of the
international donor community. It neither represents nor enjoys democratic legitimacy
amongst the Somali populace. Moreover the incompetence and corruption of many TFG
officials is such that, their presence and contributions in discussions on piracy, do little to
inspire confidence in international efforts.
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1.7 Accordingly, the present submissions may well constitute the very first time that the
view of Somali’s has genuinely been sought in a formal manner, by those engaged in any
degree of political oversight of international efforts to suppress piracy. To that extent the
Council of Somali Organisations extends its sincere gratitude for the leadership and foresight
of the committee in facilitating and receiving these submissions.
1.8 We would further respectfully request that the committee uses its best offices and
endeavours to promote the inclusion of the Somali diaspora in all UK and EU fora relating to
Piracy, fisheries governance and Security sector reform, including as part of its final
recommendations for the present evidence session.
1.9 Before addressing the issues of interest to the committee, it may be helpful to provide
some background information on the preparation of the present submission by the Council
of Somali Organisations.
2. The Author
2.1 This submission has been prepared by Omer Ahmed, founder and director of the
Council of Somali Organisations.
2.2 Omer is a solicitor with experience inter alia, of advising a wide range of parties in
relation to legal and policy issues pertinent to Somalia, including piracy and has advised
amongst others Medicins Sans Frontiers in Mogadisho and Brussels, Interpol, risk
management Consultants, as officials engaged in Counter piracy in the Transitional Federal
Government of Somalia, coastal regions and in Somaliland.
3. The Council of Somali Organisations
3.1 The Council of Somali Organisations is an independent organisation, representing and
advocating on behalf of the Somali diaspora in the UK, and promoting Anglo Somali comity
and mutual understanding. The organisations work benefits from generous financial support
from the Trust for London and the City Bridge Trust.
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3.2 The Council of Somali Organisations was established inter alia, to deliver capacity
building support to increase the operational effectiveness of organisations supporting Somali
communities.
3.3 The agency also works to amplify the voice of the Somali community on a wide range of
policy issues, and acts as a platform for liaison and cooperation with Whitehall departments
and international agencies and partners with an interest in issues pertinent to the Somali
diaspora in the UK, EU and the Horn of Africa.
3.4 The Council of Somali Organisations is managed by an active and dedicated board of
Trustees, recruited through an independent selection process, and is supported on an
advisory basis by a wide range of Somali and non Somali professionals.
3.5 One measure of the effectiveness of our policy and representational activities, was
reflected in a meeting chaired by Omer Ahmed in Downing Street between the Prime
Minister David Cameron, and the Somali diaspora on 20th February 2012. On 22nd February
2012 the Foreign Secretary William Hague in a pre London conference reception at
Lancaster House, identified the Council of Somali Organisations for specific praise and
commendation for influencing government thinking on key Somali matters.
“I thank Chatham House and the Council of Somali Organisations for their part in
supporting these discussions, which really have made a contribution to our thinking
and our policy”. 2
3.6 The CSO represents a broad range of Somali diaspora organisations in the UK. We also
have civil society organisations within our membership based in Somalia, including coastal
communities affected by piracy, such as Haradhere the scene of the 17 second burst of fire
of which your Lordships have heard much.
3.7 In preparing these submissions the Council of Somali Organisations has consulted with
2 http://www.fco.gov.uk/en/news/latestnews/?view=Speech&id=733712482
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member organisations in the UK and consulted with Somalis on the ground across all
regions, dealing with security risks posed by pirate groups operating in their districts.
3.8 The purpose of the present submission therefore, is to provide the Committee with a
broad overview, of Somali civil society thinking in relation to piracy. The submissions of an
alternative narrative on counter piracy efforts, based on the perspectives of the Somali
diaspora, particularly as coastal communities in South Central Somalia, are not readily able
to proffer their views on the conduct of EUNAVFOR and other maritime security platforms
such CTF-150 & CTF151. The present submission will focus on those areas which are of
most concern to our members and to Somalis.
3.9 The evidence we proffer fall within the following broad headings:
Somali Diaspora: An untapped Resource
Normalising HMG & EU Presence In Mogadisho
Maritime Security Operation Atalanta Mandates & Eucap Nestor
Coherence of the EU Response
Somali Exclusive Economic Zone.
Illegal Unregulated and Unreported Fishing
European Union Fisheries Policy & IUUF
Comparative Value of Illicit Flows - K&R & IUUF
Hostis Omnium Generis: Universal Human Rights: Unfair & Unsafe Piracy
Prosecutions
Somali Diaspora Solutions to Piracy 1:Ceeldaraad Ltd & Fishing For Peace
Somali Diaspora Solutions to Piracy 2: Council of Somali Organisations recommendations
4. DIASPORA AS AN UNTAPPED RESOURCE
4.1 It would be useful at the outset to say a few words about the role of the Somali
Diaspora.
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4.2 The UK has a large and vibrant Somali diaspora community which is a substantial asset to
HMG. The Somali diaspora enjoys substantial influence over transnational Somali networks
across all Somali speaking regions and across the wider region.
4.3 On the other hand, the paucity of human intelligence and in the absence of empirical
data, policy makers and national parliaments often make decisions on piracy which are not
informed by empirical evidence but often premised on desk research and open source or
operational intelligence often of low source grading3. This leads to an often myopic and one
dimensional reversion to a militaristic comfort zone.
4.4 In working with and through the Somali diaspora, many of these deficiencies can be
ameliorated. . Diaspora influence extends to the very coastal communities which are the
subject of the Committees deliberations. In addition to supplying financial and political
support, the Somali diaspora contributes many of the leading political figures in Somaliland
and Somalia, including the dynamic Mayor of Mogadisho. It is to be noted that many of the
most influential political leaders in the coastal regions are British citizens, including the
leadership of Galmuduug, and other centres of pirate activity further south in Gulhiraan and
Haradhere.
3 By way of clarification, it is to be noted that the first incidence of piracy off the Somali coast, infact took place in
1989/1990 with the hijacking of a Romanian cargo ship with a cargo of Russian goods including cigarettes destined for their
pseudo Gramician communist comrades in Mogadishu.
The vessel was hijacked by clan members of the Somali National Movement as part of Somaliland’s efforts to restrict
weapons into Mogadishu to prevent what was then descending into an orgy of violence in the aftermath the overthrow of
the genocidal Barre regime..
The ship was eventually released after the then, USSR stepped in on behalf obits Warsaw Pact ally, threatening to bomb
Somalia. The ship was returned with the crew unharmed with an unknown ransom believed to have been exchanged. The
cargo sent by the regime of Nikolai Ceausescu was however comprehensively looted and sold across Africa.
A highly topical epilogue to this incident was that this took place before the days of sophisticated ransom drops. The
ransoms were allegedly paid by wire to Barclays account in London. The hijackers did not have access to today's network
of Remittance agencies and so simply went through their pocket books and called relatives members of the UK Somali
diaspora from the bridge of the Vessel requesting bank account number of a relative.
This was picked up by Scotland Yard who arrested several people in London, though non were subsequently charged. The
ransom was recovered from a UK bank account.
This incident is interesting inasmuch is it dates piracy off the Somali coast, back to the start of the conflict in South Central.
It also underlines that the issue of tracking K&R and other illicit financial flows in relation to Somalia has a longer history.
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4.5 The Somali diaspora enjoys extensive contacts and unfettered access to all pirate
controlled areas. Far from the vastly overstated security risks (often stated as being too
dangerous even for military personnel), British Somalis frequently travel to the region and
have taken teams of journalists to meet pirate leaders..
4.6 National and International policy fora in which counter piracy is discussed, do not include
diaspora voices, instead relying on officials of the Transitional Federal Government. The
prevailing view amongst in the diaspora and indeed in Somalia and its regional
administrations, is that unfortunately for a number of reasons officials of the Transitional
Federal Government in Mogadisho, are not best placed to properly articulate Somali
concerns.
4.7 Principally, because as clients of the international donor community, it can in many
respects, be extremely difficult to challenge deficiencies by ones donors in respect of
counter piracy or wider security sector reform efforts.
4.8 The Somali diaspora in the UK, is not dependant on international donor support, and has
no political restriction or affiliations limiting its ability to articulate the views and interests of
Somalis universally, on the issue of piracy, maritime security and protection of the scarce
economic resources available to Somalis.
4.9 A principle reason often stated for failing to engage with / excluding the Somali diaspora,
is an insistence that there is no political consensus amongst the diaspora. This argument is
quintessentially, disingenuous in a number of respects, as it presupposes that a political
consensus should be any more likely amongst Somalis in the diaspora. In fact there is
consensus amongst all Somali diasporas on themes such as the need to ensure a democratic
and viable constitution is implemented, around human rights and in relation to piracy and the
Somali EEZ.
4.10 Whilst on more political matters there will continue to clan based and historic rivalries.
There is little doubt about the areas in which Somalis share almost universal consensus.
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4.11 The Council of Somali Organisations seeks to articulate and further amplify those areas
of consensus, some of which are addressed in the present submissions.
4.12 The diaspora, is able to offer land based economic and political solutions to undermine
the piracy model, inter alia, by investing in coastal communities and developing alternative
livelihoods for young people. Disaspora efforts in this regard needs to be better connected
with donor activity, which is conspicuous in its absence from the coastal regions, most
affected by piracy in South Central Somalia.
4.13 In this, and in many other important respects, the potential resource of the Somali
diaspora remains largely untapped.
4.14 Whilst this has been a source of considerable frustration, there is a fair degree of
optimism too. HMG has substantially enhanced its awareness of, and engagement with the
Somali diaspora, identifying opportunities to work with the diaspora on a number of themes.
4.15 Much of the credit for this has to go to the efforts in the particularly since mid 2011 of
HMG officials. Whilst the wider East Africa directorate, and no doubt the leadership of the
Foreign Secretary have also been central to this improvement.
4.16 The work of both Sally Axleworthy, and Tom Crofts of the FCO Somali unit, warrants
a specific mention here, in improving the quality, relevance and content of dialogue with the
Somali diaspora, to unprecedented levels. The Council of Somali Organisations has been at
the forefront of supporting those efforts, and believes that the step change in mutual
understanding can only be of significant benefit to HMGs work in the region, and serves as a
potential template for effective engagement of diaspora communities.
4.17 The Council of Somali Organisations will continue to support and where necessary to
challenge HMG and EU thinking and policy making, to secure and enhance the quality of
HMG & EU interventions in relation to the Somali polity and indeed the wider Horn of
Africa region.
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4.18 This paper sets out additional contributions of the Anglo Somali diaspora, in respect of
Somali led solutions to piracy, involving diaspora led private sector investments to
undermine the much vaunted piracy business model. Including innovative diaspora led
initiatives. Fishing for Peace, is a compelling and powerful example of Diaspora initiatives
with substantial social benefits to vulnerable coastal communities (see page Somali Diaspora
Solutions)
5. STABILISATION: NORMALISING HMG & EU PRESENCE IN MOGADISHO
5.1 The much heralded land based solutions to piracy, are very much dependent on the
timing, of pacification and stabilisation of Somalia. Operational difficulties are compounded by
the challenges of the transitional process, which adversely affects the planning processes,
generating a damaging time lag in delivery, as already stated.
5.2 The Council of Somali Organisations on behalf of the diaspora, has advised HMG, EU and
UN institutions, including UNPOS, that the process of pacification and stabilisation of South
Central beginning with Mogadisho, cannot realistically achieved without the support of
diaspora based professionals
5.3 Moreover, the requirement for this support was quite foreseeable and indicates that the
international community particularly at the EU and UN level, need to be more proactive in
adapting diaspora recruitment processes, so that the security gains in Alshaabab cleared
areas can be consolidated into rapid socio economic improvements in liberated areas.
5.4 The Council of Somali Organisations works with amongst others, the UK Stabilisation
Unit, to identify suitable mechanisms to facilitate deeper and more operationally relevant
engagement with its influential Somali diaspora. This includes proffering diaspora candidates
for deployment as part of a proposed Somali cadre of experts, deployable across the region.
5.5 This is a particularly important development, given the requirement for the international
donor community to develop an increasingly visible presence in Mogadisho and South
Central Somalia, as part of the transitional normalisation and stabilisation of South Central.
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5.6 The challenges of the political and security environment are amongst the reasons why
the planning for recruitment in this area by the international community, lags some 12-18
months behind the facts being created on the ground, and this gap in many respects is the
hallmark of the international community’s failures in Somalia.
5.7 From a diaspora perspective, the implementation of international interventions in
Somalia, suffer from ineffective political oversight and performance management, leading to
planning processes are not proactive in anticipating and addressing changes in the political
and security environment in Somalia. This leads to a substantive time lag between security
gains on the ground, and visible evidence of those gains for the local populace.
5.8 An example of the effects of this time lag, is that despite the fact that the political
transition in Somalia agreed in Kampala in June 2011, is scheduled to end on 20 August 2012,
the construction of a secure diplomatic presence in Mogadisho, has not begun. Limiting
HMG and the EU presence to Aden Cadde International Airport.
5.9 The UK presence in Somalia, and that of its EU partners will continue to suffer from a
credibility gap, in the absence of a secure embassy compound in the city. The unfavourable
local impression when compared to the Turkish stance will continue to have a deleterious
effect on perceptions of HMG and EU objectives in Somalia.
5.10 EU operational activity in Somalia continues to be conducted by remote control from
Nairobi, which will remain the de facto capital of Somalia, until the EU and HMG invests in a
permanent diplomatic presence in Mogadisho.
5.11 The lead times involved in deploying Somali civilians, are therefore vitally critical in
terms of the international community’s ability to timeously deliver stabilisation and back fill
capacity.
5.12 It is also important to bear in mind that an increased diplomatic presence in Somalia
whilst politically significant, would not have any meaningful impact on combating piracy per
se, and it is therefore incumbent on the committee to recognise that there is little piracy to
be had, in Mogadisho. It is the coastal strip between Puntland and Mogadisho in which
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policing of the maritime coastline and onshore is a critical issue yet to be comprehensively
tackled.
6. MARITIME SECURITY EUNAVFOR/ EUCAP NESTOR:MANDATES
The principle concern of Somalis with respect to Operation Atalanta, and other EU led
efforts is the extent to which the security and well being of coastal communities are is
enhanced. In broad terms Somalis believe, that the only aspect of current operations which
could be of benefit to coastal communities is the protection of the scarce marine resources
available to Somali communities along a long and vulnerable coastline.
6.1 Increased militarisation, brings few benefits and numerous risks to Somali coastal
communities. The new and more aggressive posture of naval forces, operating closer to the
shoreline, has resulted in several incidents of Somali fishermen being killed, due to
“misidentification.” Such incidents do not receive much attention beyond Somalia. There is
likely to be an increase in the number of innocent Somali fishermen killed by naval forces, on
the basis that they simply looked like pirates. This is perceived by Somalis to be one of the
direct consequences of the EU’s recent decision to adopt a more aggressive stance.4
6.2 The starting point for Somalis in assessing the impact of operation Atalanta is the content
of the missions mandate. From a Somali perspective therefore, the nature of the EU and
EUNVAFORS counter piracy engagement is entirely offshore, with no evidence of any work
to implement land based solutions as this is not reflected in either the mandate or current
activity.
6.3 The mandated purpose of Operation Atalanta is purely to protect the interest of the
international community from Somalis. By definition it does not protect Somalis from the
international community. Often far from being a benign force protecting maritime trade
from Somali pirates, both Operation Atalanta and other naval forces, including
Italian,American and Russian forces, have allegedly killed and injured (fishermen allegedly
mistaken for pirates. These incidents and the perception of impunity may be a matter of
4 http://piracy-studies.org/2012/the-eus-misguided-move-to-fight-pirates-onshore/
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perception, yet perceptions fuel narratives in which coastal communities become inured to
piracy, reinforcing the piracy business model.
6.4 It is widely believed amongst Somalis that the international community has not taken on
into consideration the need of Somalis to have exclusive use of their own coastline. Somalis
frequently allege that the EUNAVFOR mandate is not remotely concerned with the
protection of Somalis, the Somali coastline or the Somali Exclusive Economic Zone. In that
sense, operation Atalanta, is perceived as yet another hostile foreign military force.
6.5 Whilst EUNVAFOR publicly purports that its operational mandate includes to “monitor
fishing”, a cursory glance at the stated legal basis for any of the published Council decisions
on Somali piracy, discloses that infact there is little if any formal commitment to protecting
or monitoring fishing in Somali waters, in the official decisions and documents of the EU, and
there is even less practical operational commitment. In his evidence before the Committee
Nick Harvey Minister for armed forces5, to his credit stated a more accurate view of the
mandate of operation Atalanta without reference to protection of Somali fisheries and other
natural resources.
6.6 This is problematic inasmuch as EU council decisions in relation to combating piracy,
were promulgated to reflect UN Security Council Resolutions which clearly include the
requirement of protecting Somalia’s rights with respect to offshore natural resources,
including fisheries, in accordance with international law”.6
6.7 The role of operation Atalanta and how it is perceived by Somalis, needs to be
understood in this context.
5 At Question Number 70: Evidence of Nick Harvey MP and Captain Reindorp RN Evidence Session No. 3. Questions 64 -
108 Thursday 14 June 2012 Heard in Public. (Combating Somali Piracy: The EU's Naval Operation Atalanta - Follow-Up
Report)
6 Contained in Resolution 1851 (2008) Adopted by the Security Council at its 6046th meeting, on 16 December 2008
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6.8 The reality that EUNAVFOR in fact works diligently to keeping illegal trawlers away from
Somali waters, is lost in translation, amidst the cacophony of mutual condemnation and
recriminations around declaration of a Somali EEZ.
6.9 To the extent that the EUCAP NESTOR Programme will make a difference, remains to
be seen. The funds earmarked for coastal enforcement really do need to be reviewed and
supplemented with significant development assistance. It is also essential that EUCAP
NESTOR, in building regional capacity, ensures that Somali lawyers (of whom there are many
in the diaspora), are engaged in the development of the developing regional legal
architecture, in terms of both criminal, public and private law. Indeed this should be
fundamental to the mandate of this new mission.
7. COHERENCE OF THE EU RESPONSE
7.1 The absence of a Somali EEZ undermines operation Atalanta’s legal capacity to prevent
illegal fishing, and this is itself a matter of real concern. Particularly given that the EU and
other naval mission off Somalia take their authority partially from UN Security Council
Resolutions, which require states to suppress illegal fishing.
7.2 It is respectfully suggested that the Committee should as part of its recommendations
call for a declaration of a Somali Exclusive Economic Zone, taking full account of Somali’s
historic claims and sensitivities in this regard, and an amendment to the present mandate to
task EUNAVOR with actively protecting the waters they patrol from illegal fishermen and
those transporting toxic material through the Somali littoral. Making public, the monitoring
of illegal fishing since the inception of the EUNAVOR mission, and communicating the
benefits to Somali communities, is essential in undermining the currency of the piracy
business model.
7.3 The hijacking incident involving the MV Leopard, and the cargo aboard that vessel when
it was hijacked, again points to the implausibly permissive mandate of EUNAVFOR. This
vessel has along history of allegedly transporting highly toxic waste in and near Somali
waters. It is also allegedly used to transport weapons in the region. Other similar vessels
hijacked including the Ukrainian vessel MV Faina have seen Somali pirates offloading high
caliber ammunition including depleted uraniums rounds.
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7.4 The international community has yet to act on the concerns raised regarding toxic
dumping and dangerous cargoes, or in fact remained silent on why such cargoes are allowed
to sail in or near Somali waters, given the evident risks from piracy and terrorism. The
EUNavfor mandate should include observance of the Basel Convention on the Control of
Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal. Of course the lack of
ratification of these instruments by an incompetent TFG means that this remains a
substantial lacunae in regional coastal protection regimes. This however, should not deprive
Somalis of the protection of such instruments.
7.5 Capacitating Somali diaspora organisations and local NGOs to sensitise the national
authorities, could accelerate TFG accession to the relevant treaties and regional instruments
7.6 Exit strategies for Operation Atalanta, are however very much dependant on the success
of land based solutions which to date have not been articulated. The committee asked
prescient questions in relation to exit strategies. Despite the talk of exit strategies, these
strategies are hostage to mismanagement of the transitional processes by the international
community and TFG politicians in particular, and the continuation of the current remote
control engagement with Somalia, will not yield the mandated results desired by the
international community.
7.7 The reason why coastal communities continue to have little option but to tacitly support
piracy in their regions, was presciently summarised in the evidence of Alexander Rondos in
support of accelerating stabilisation initiatives to all regions; as follows:
"Now, I believe that in the next year this is the strategic challenge in Somalia.But we
also have to be very imaginative and also widen the angle of the geographic lens. We
should not simply be talking about the stabilisation of areas, if you will, retrieved from
Shabaab control. It is the stabilisation of the entire country, including the coastal
areas”.
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What does stabilisation mean? Having a modicum of decent Government. You are not
shooting each other and you are part of a decent economy, or an economy that is
functioning That is why extending the notion of stabilisation and investing in
coastal areas becomes an absolute key in offering an alternative incentive to
communities for whom, in most instances, and clearly now, reluctantly feel they need
to allow or tolerate piracy to operate from near their communities areas becomes an
absolute key in offering an alternative incentive to communities for whom, in most
instances, and clearly now, reluctantly feel they need to allow or tolerate piracy to
operate from near their communities”. 7
7.8 Ultimately the main diaspora concern regarding the relationship between EUNAVOR
and the EU strategic Framework for the Horn of Africa, is a fundamental concern regarding
the lack of coherence between the two.
7.9 EUNAVFOR exit strategies for 2014 are entirely dependent on the EU development
programme and wider security sector and political reform, actually reaching the Somali coast
line most affected by piracy. External support from diaspora experts may contribute critically
to enhancing strategic coherence in aligning EUNAVFOR & EU CAP Nestor, objectives and
development priorities.
7.10 Mr Rondos in his evidence to the committee identified a failure of intellect and political
will which makes renders nugatory the idea that coastal themselves communities are part of
the solution. The Council of Somalia Organisations on behalf of coastal communities rasies
the following question, which should it is suggested, become a central theme of this
committees questions to policy makers at the EU level.
If pacification and stabilisation of the Somali coastline is the most decisive mean of ending
piracy, where is the investment in those communities?
Can we genuinely achieve stabilisation with 70 rounds of sniper fire from a helicopter a mile
offshore? This has prescient echoes of the words of Ghandi, who remarked.
7 response to s question from Q179 Lord Jay of Ewelme: Combating Somali Piracy: The EU'S Naval Operation Atalanta -
Follow-Up Report Evidence Session No. 5. Heard in Public. Questions 176 - 234 Thursday 21 June 2012
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“One cannot shake hands with a clenched fist.”
Why is it easier to shoot at Somalis rather than to talk to them?
7.11 It is most important that the committee is not left with the erroneous impression that
the 17 seconds attack on Haradehere remotely effected the calculations of battle hardened
leaders of pirate groups. The attack was greeted with incredulity, and the action was
understood to have been intended for domestic political consumption, rather than as a
serious message to pirate groups.
7.12 In fact the message received by pirates was that EUNAVOR is not serious about
meaningful measures, but must appear to be more robust to placate the jingoistic demands
from some quarters of the international media eager for a show of force against an enemy
whose threat is largely a construct of the same media.
7.13 The Council of Somali Organisations, has been asked to extend an invitation to the
honourable chair of the committee and (members thereof), as well as to the commanding
officers of operation Atalanta, to visit Haradhere. The invitation is proffered by one, Mr.
Bahdon, a British national, the regional governor in which Haradhere, was the scene of the
attack, for a dialogue with him and local people.
7.14 Coastal communities have not been silent or passive in relation to the security
challenges which they face. They have persistently lobbied donors for small scale support to
help them develop local mobile marine cadres to patrol their local coastline and also provide
a security presence to deter Alshabab activity in the hinterland in South-central. Kidnapped
seafarers, and Alshabaab bases are located around the South Central coastline and its
hinterland. Without the training, equipment and tools to challenge extremely well financed
pirates and terrorists, coastal communities are forced into an uneasy pact with both sets of
criminals, not of choice but out of the need for self preservation.
8. REGIONAL CAPACITY & EXIT STRATEGIES
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8.1 The current menu of options within the contemplation of the International Community
for land based solutions to piracy, include the following:
Amisom Forces clearing coastal areas. This is entirely unrealistic given the size of their
deployment and the fact that it has taken Amisom several years to begin to move beyond
Mogadisho. At the current rate of travel Amisom cannot realistically be expected to
extend security to coastal regions.
Deployment of Somali Army Units to coastal regions, providing a counter piracy and
counter terrorism function.
8.2 Establishment of Police, criminal justice and coastal enforcement capacity under the
command of local administrations (and ideally part of a unified force structure integrated
into the nascent Somali national Army/ Defence Force) in coastal regions.
8.3 A sober assessment of the timeframe in which any of the above outcomes is likely to be
achieved, would render the "exit strategy" suggested in previous evidence before the
committee (most notably Capt. Reindorp and Nick Harvey) to be most optimistic. The pace
of travel indicates that the EU and other missions will need to be extended well beyond
2014 and potentially extended twice more.
8.4 Despite two large scale missions to train up a national army led by the Americans and
the EU Training Mission, some of 5-7,000 Somalis have been trained since 2008, the extent
to which any or all of these have been deployed is questionable.
8.5 What is certain however, is that the numbers are not close to being sufficient to address
the wide range of security challenges Somalia faces.
8.6 The pace of training and deployment is too slow, to meet the needs of the international
community for a secured Somali coastline and amelioration of the transnational threats
posed by Somali pirates and extremist groups and clan based militias.
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8.7 This will substantially limit the ability of Somalis, HMG and EU to backfill and stabilise
areas liberated by AMISOM. At the current rate of training and deployment of the Somali
National Army, it is fanciful to presume that the operation Atalanta mission can be
completed by 2014. The true duration of this level of deployment may realistically be closer
to 2018.
8.8 The pace of security reform means that there will be continue to be no reliable security
presence in South Central Somalia for some years to come. Local coastal communities will
continue to be starved of development assistance, all of which will continue to fuel local
support for piracy as legitimate economic activity, indeed, it is the only economic activity for
many.
8.9 The answer here is to give support to the regional administrations located South of
Puntland. In particular Gulhiraan and Haradhere as well as Galmudug. They are best placed
to confront pirates onshore, and to police their coastlines, and to help free the large number
of hostages held within those two specific regions. These include abducted seafarers from
the developing world as well as Danes, South Koreans, Indians, and Seychellois nationals.
8.10 Presently the political leadership of those regions have no means or ability to confront
pirates other than through moral arguments which cut little ice.
8.11 It cannot be beyond the wit of the international community to deliver security training
to develop local police and paramilitary forces, including delivery through contracting with
the private sector, to source reputable security training and equipment.
8.12 If states are unable or unwilling themselves to supply security support to coastal
communities, then there is a moral obligation not to get in the way. The current Security
Council embargo on weapons into Somalia is dangerously misguided, inasmuch as it conflates
the provision of training with, even if conducted by reputable and licensed.
8.13 Perversely he embargo does not remotely affect the ability of pirates and terrorists to
obtain new weapons. It does however, restrict the legitimate legal authorities’ from
procurement for the purpose of civil defence of their communities from pirates and
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terrorists. This constitutes part of the perverse incentives which underwrite the piracy
model, which is not properly articulated and hence receives little attention.
8.14 Whilst the international donor communities maintains its risk averse stance, coastal
communities bear the brunt of those very risks.
8.15 The resources dedicated funding talks about counter piracy and an astonishing array of
counter piracy meetings and conferences, could be better utilised in implementing the land
based solutions that promoted as the silver bullet that will end piracy.
8.16 Properly trained, incentivised and with the support of local clan and political elders,
pirate base could be occupied overnight, creating space for emergency employment schemes
and infrastructure development to create fisheries businesses to draw young people away
towards vocational training and away from piracy.
9. HOSTIS OMNIUM HUMANIS GENERIS - UNIVERSAL HUMAN RIGHTS:
UNFAIR & UNSAFE PIRACY PROSECUTIONS
9.1 Diaspora perspectives on the conduct of piracy trials, is informed by a desire to secure
enhanced appreciation of human rights and the rule of law in Somalia, and the region as a
whole, thus echoing the requirement set out in Security Council Resolutions on the matter
that seizure, detention limits, transfer, prosecution and incarceration of suspected pirates is
consistent with applicable international law including human rights law.
9.2 Present arrangements for prosecuting pirates have been conceived in a febrile political
atmosphere in which immediate solutions were demanded to the problems of capture and
release, he process in which naval forces released most of those detained for suspected of
piracy.
9.3 Capture and release frustrating as it appeared, was often premised on a sound
assessment of the legal circumstances of detention, as many of these incidents were
occurring within Somalia’s 12 nm territorial waters.
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9.4 However, piracy as an offence in international law, in accordance with UNCLOS Article8
can only occur on the high seas, which includes the 200 nm exclusive economic zone), and
by definition not in territorial waters. Prosecution for alleged acts of piracy within territorial
waters are legally problematic. Offences within territorial waters constitute acts of robbery,
and are therefore to be disposed of domestically within the Somali penal code.
9.5 By corollary, the legality of prosecutions of alleged pirates, by third parties (eg Kenya &
Seychelles) and subsequent transfer and incarceration by fourth parties (Somaliland and
Puntland), is a questionable practice, and a significant violation of UNCLOS. Article 1059
which requires that the arresting states own courts to prosecute.
9.6 The regional prosecutorial circus in relation to piracy, from a Somali perspective, is no
more than a fig leaf, to spare the blushes of states contributing naval forces to operation
Atalanta and related naval operations.
9.7 EU states have been reluctant to undertake piracy prosecutions, for good reason
reasons. Amongst the reasons not stated publicly is the strong likelihood that many of those
prosecutions would infact collapse or otherwise not succeed either at first instance or on
appeal, given the circumstance in which alleged pirates are arrested, and difficulties with
identification and forensic evidence.
9.8 The acquittal in June 2012, in Paris of two alleged pirates in relation to the French vessel
Le Ponant in 2008. After four years of pre trial detention, two were acquitted, and four
sentenced to between 4 and years10.
9.9 One of the reasons for the length of pre trial detention, was the fact that France did not
have in place a law criminalising piracy, and was reliant on a legally obsolete penal instrument
of 1825, until one was promulgated in 7th January 2012
8 UNCLOS Article 101(a)(1),
9 UNCLOS Article 105 : The courts of the State which carried out the seizure may decide upon the
penalties to be imposed,
10 substantially less than 15 years sentences demanded by prosecutors.
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9.10 The Somali perspective here is to question the legal and moral legitimacy and
indeed the utility of prosecuting Somali children before EU courts (as has happened in
Germany)11 with 4 defendants under the age of 18, and some as
young as 13 years old.
9.11 This is a very important human rights issue, one which policy makers at all levels
including within the UN institutions charged with holding up the universal declaration of
human rights, in all UN operations, should be cautious of.
9.12 In response to an issue raised by Baroness Eccles of Moulton,12 the committee may be
interested in enquiring further into the demographic profile of those detained and convicted
for piracy. Many are minors and more still are former child soldiers, presaged into the
service of pirate groups, and otherwise coerced by poverty to join pirate groups.
9.13 Whilst Some provisions of international law include Article 40 of the UN Convention
on the Rights of the Child, envisages prosecution of minors, this is solely restricted and
qualified by the requirement for an objectively fair procedure is adopted which takes
cognizance of the specific vulnerabilities of young people in the penal system.
9.14 It is respectfully submitted that the prosecution of Somali minors in the context of
regional prosecutions in third countries, does not meet the standard set out in the UN
Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Current trial procedures in the conduct of piracy trials, give rise to legitimate and grave
concerns about the fairness of piracy prosecutions. It is unfortunate that alleged Somali
pirates are conceived & spoken of by the international community as if they were enemy
combatants in a conflict. This has lead to a policy approach, which abandons the principle of
universal human rights in favour of “a good enough approach.”
11 Regarding the hijacking of the German vessel The MV Taipan, April 5, 2010.
12 At question 193. Combating Somali Piracy: The EU's Naval Operation Atalanta - Follow-Up Report Evidence Session No.
5. Heard in Public. Questions 176 – 234, Thursday 21 June 2012
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9.15 This approach essentially holds, that alleged Somali pirates should not expect to be
treated any better than say Kenyan nationals in the Kenyan judicial & penal system, and that
accordingly it would create an invidious situation if Somalis tried in Kenya are accorded
treatment consistent with their universal rights, when Kenyan nationals may not be accorded
access to basic human rights.
9.16 This approach is in the UN-led arrangements made for the prosecution of alleged
Somali pirates taking place in Mombassa Kenya and other jurisdictions.
9.17 The practical implications of this approach, is a conviction rate approaching 95 %, and
virtually no meaningful right of appeal. There have been virtually no appeals on challenging
either the conviction or length of sentence. These statistical outcomes point to
prosecutorial bias and inherently unfair nature of the proceedings, and unsafe convictions
generated.
9.18 It is highly likely that many of the states whose navies originally conducted the arrest
and detentions, may find themselves liable to civil proceedings to recover damages for
unlawful detention and transfer, often of children for prosecution and incarceration by third
parties.
10. EQUALITY OF ARMS
The committee would do well to enquire in more detail as to the conduct of proceedings. In
particular the extent to which those detained EU naval forces are deprived of the procedural
and legal protections offered by the ECHR, in terms of the right to challenge and call witness
evidence13 the right to adequate time and facilities14 and the right to legal assistance15
10.1 Example
13 Article 6(3)(d),
14 Article 6(3)(b)
15 Article 6(3)(c).
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A Somali teenager is arrested on a fishing vessel interdicted by an EU naval vessel, whilst
adrift in the sea. He is with 11 others and the vessel has several rusty AK47 rifles on board.
From the moment of arrest the provisions of the ECHR as confirmed in the Medvedyev,16
ruling is that once a state expresses its jurisdiction by detaining alleged pirates, the detention time
limits of that state and the procedural requirements of the ECHR are immediately engaged,
and crucial protections in theory activated. This was confirmed by the Whilst some nations
(most notably the Danish & German naval forces) have recognised this problem and begun
to deploy judicial authorities onboard their warships) this is by no means universal, patrolling
the Somali coast).
Following detention on a warship which may last several weeks (and in many instances this
may be for several months), the teenager is transferred to Kenya for trial, where he may
detained for many more months before a trial begins.
10.2 His lawyer who does not speak Somali and works through interpreters cannot
undertake any investigation of child’s background. He has no facilities to take witness
statements from the child’s family members or character references.
10.3 On the other hand the prosecutions, has access to forensic laboratories, video suites to
enable naval officers on warships to give evidence, prosecutors who have been given
specialised training around piracy law, and access to a network prosecutors working on
similar cases.
10.4 The child, does not access to independent legal advice and representation. This selected
for him by the same UN agencies which have ensured that the prosecuting authorities have
sufficient resources and tools at their disposal.
10.5 The conduct of these trials do not meet UN standards, and would not be acceptable in
trials held outside of the region. Moreover in relation to children, these trials do not meet
16Medvedyev v France (Application no. 3394/03), In the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) Grand Chamber Medvedyev v
France (Application no. 3394/03),
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the requirements of the United Nations Rules for the Protection of Juveniles Deprived of
their Liberty.17
In the circumstances, the notion that the conduct of piracy trials in the region are fair trials,
is far from the reality of the situation. They may be considered fair in the context of local
Kenyan standards. However, the transfer of Somalis to a third party jurisdiction under the
authority of United Nations Security Council Resolutions, requires that these cases are
prosecuted in compliance with international human rights standards. Accordingly, the
present arrangements constitute no more than, a veneer of legal respectability to be
reported to national parliaments and at international conferences.
10.6 The statistical outcomes in terms of conviction rates approaching 100 % with no
appeals submitted however, disclose a more accurate picture which undermines the
credibility of current regional prosecutions from the perspective of human rights.
10.7 Far from strengthening the rule of law in the region, the way that the international
community through the UN have chosen to conduct these trials is likely to have a
deleterious impact on the rule of law across the region, with significant implications for
judicial practice relating to the conduct of fair trials and human rights.
10.8 The Council of Somali Organisations, condemns this approach as being wholly
inconsistent with the application of universal human rights, and such practices undermine do
not meet the specific requirements of UN Security Council Resolutions.
11. EXCLUSIVE ECONOMIC ZONE
11.1 The status of the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) covering some 3,330 kilometres is in
many ways the elephant in the room for Somalis universally. The issue complex as it is can
be summarised as a fundamental difference of opinion.
11.2
A. Somalia has an EEZ which has been flagrantly exploited by international fleets since 1988,
although the Govt of the Barre regime collapsed in 1991, had effectively lost control of many
17 Adopted by General Assembly resolution 45/113of 14 December 1990
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regions by the late 1980s.
B. In policy circles the oft stated position is that Somalia may have enjoyed a de facto EEZ,
and issued licenses under a national law. To the extent that this does not accord with the
requirements of UNCLOS, and that an EEZ may need to be registered but does not
presently subsist.
Somalis as a whole are extremely wary of accepting any outcome which could it is argued be
used to legitimate the rampant theft and depletion of Somalia's natural marine resources by
the international community.
It is important for HMG, and the EUs naval and political operations to
appreciate the visceral nature of Somalis commitment to protect scarce resources.
11.3 The socio economic, political and security ramifications of failing to prevent the large
foreign EU and Asian trawler fleets operating illegally and with impunity across Somali and
indeed other vulnerable African coastlines, is incalculable.
11.4 Despite the many factions, political, clan and regional rivalries, Somalis universally are
peculiarly ad idem on the historic existence of an EEZ across the entire Somali littoral.
Somalis hold that the right to freely and exclusively enjoy resources within their territory
including their EEZ is a fundamental right.
11.5 Moreover, Somalis argue that the fact that the Somali polity and the sovereign rights
attaching thereto have been in a prolonged fragile, does not legitimate international doubts
around the EEZ issue.
11.6 The discovery of significant hydro carbon reserves in blocks largely located within the
Somali EEZ, is already fuelling future tensions with Kenya, regarding potential adverse claims
in blocks straddling the waters of both countries.
11.7 Addressing the EEZ issue was a key aspect of the Kampala Roadmap & the Garowe
accords. This has not to date been progressed. Somali observers therefore deplore the lack
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of political commitment to manage the implementation of this aspect of the August 2012
transition.
11.8 Together with bitter opposition to the absence of democratic process and Somali
ownership of the draft constitution. Somalis cite the EEZ issue as one in which Somali
political and economic rights will remain in a suspended state in ceaseless transitory state
subordinate to the will of regional and international actors, many with opaque vested
interests.
For EUNAVFOR and the international community, getting the messaging and
communications right on these issues is critically important. Understanding and cognizance
of the substantive views of Somalis, is therefore essential.
11. EU FISHERIES POLICY & ILLEGAL UNREGULATED & UNREPORTED
FISHING:
Fisheries resource within 200 nautical miles off the coast of Somalia have
been conservatively estimated to be capable of providing sustainable annual
catches of 200,000 tons.26 Because of the known substantial pelagic fish
resources, including tuna and mackerel species which have high unit values,
the long-term development of these resources could be of vast importance to
the economy and food security in the region.18
11.1 Whilst the relationship between IUUF and piracy off the Somali littoral is given at best a
cursory glance in policy circles, there is an undeniable nexus between the two.
11.2 Somalis rightly condemn the role of EU Common Fisheries Policy for promoting the
exploitation of fishing stocks outside EU waters (whilst stringent legal protection is in place
for the EUs own territorial waters). This concern extends to the particular United Nations
organs with oversight of IUUF, off the Somali coast in particular the regional fishery
18 UN Food and Agriculture Administration estimate of Somalia’s fisheries
(ftp://ftp.fao.org/FI/document/fcp/en/FI_CP_SO.pdf.)
Report of the Secretary-General on the protection of Somali natural resources and waters
S/2011/661
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management agencies the IOTC (Indian Ocean Tuna Commission) and the SWIOFC
(Southwest Indian Ocean Fisheries Commission).
11.3 A highly disturbing feature of the IUUF in Somalia, is the extent to which IUUF fleets
are funded as a matter of EU policy to exploit (illegally) fishing stocks outside EU waters. It is
unhelpful for policy makers to deny there is a problem here. EU officials have repeatedly
asserted to the author, that incidents of piracy have driven off illegal fishermen. The fact that
many of the vessels captured in and just off the Somali EEZ, are in fact illegal trawlers from
the EU, Korea, Thailand, China & UAE. This leads to unfavourable perceptions amongst
Somalis who allege that from the very states who supply vessels to protect their illegal
fishing fleets.
11.4 The story of the Spanish trawler the Alkrana, is a salient example of how EU policy may
have contributed to IUUF the Somali coastline. The owners of the Alkrana are alleged to
have received some 4,272,960Euros towards the cost of the vessel, on the contractual
understanding that this vessel would not be used in EU waters.
11.5 This policy is extremely problematic, from both a political and legal perspective. It
leaves the EU seriously exposed to substantial risks of litigation in the context of IUUF and
environmental law.
11.6 Many of the vessels funded by the EU, are classed as bottom trawlers, which employ
the most environmentally unsustainable methods of fishing. These methods have increased
significantly the economic losses suffered by Somali coastal communities, and this is
compounded by the loss of nutritional staples that should be for the sole benefit of the
poorest communities in the world. This constitutes a grave violation of the human rights and
economic rights of all Somalis.
11.7 From a Somali perspective the fact that the five contact Working groups are
chaired (possibly with the exception of WG 2) by states whose fleets are
implicated in unprecedented levels of theft, fraud and large scale financial
laundering of illicit funds (because this is what IUUF entails at its raison d'être)
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12. COMPARATIVE VALUE E OF ILLICIT FLOWS - K&R v IUUF
12.1 As a brief aside in relation to the of tracking illicit finances. The efforts of the
international community to track and trace the illicit proceeds of ransom
payments, is in many ways intellectually flawed. Illegal fishing conducted
under the noses of Operation Atalanta commanders, can see large freezer
trawler generate illegal catch, and launder approx USD 500K to USD 2 million per month.
Well over a thousand illegal trawlers regularly fish in the Somali EEZ and within its territorial
waters.
12.2 The international community needs to review its silence on the conduct and proceeds
legal unregulated and undeclared fishing in Somali waters, and the impact
that this has in regional and global security. The focus on K&R suppresses
prevalence of billions of dollars of illicit funds generated by trans national commercial and
criminal networks. Many like the Spanish illegal trawler Alkrana
are specifically funded by EU tax payers subsidies.
12.3 In this context operation Atalanta is perceived (wholly unfairly one would add) by
Somalis to operate no differently to the role of the Royal Navy in protecting heroin suppliers
in the Opium wars of the 18th Century.
13. DIASPORA SOLUTIONS
13.1 The Council of Somali Organisations, urges HMG, the EU and the international
community to ensure that the following measures are secured within the transitional period.
SOLUTIONS 1 : Please refer to attached Appendix 1 Briefing Note Fishing for
Peace Ceeldarad Fishing Co. Ltd
SOLUTIONS 2 : Council of Somali Organisations Recommendations
immediate recognition of Somalia's historic Exclusive Economic Zone.
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A sensible interim measure would be to task EUNAVOR to increase surveillance and
interdiction of non Somali vessels operating in and around the EEZ area, especially during
peak fishing seasons for high value pelagic stocks, including the autumnal Tuna season.
To supply coastal patrols and coastal surveillance capability to regional administrations.
Undertaking joint patrols in South central Somalia. Policing coastal waters can be delivered
more efficiently and substantially lower operating costs. This would further enhance the rule
of law by developing a nascent coastguard function for both the TFG and the various local
and regional authorities which will arise following the 20th August 2012 transition date on
South Central.
Giving authority to regional administrations in partnership with donors to identify
opportunities to provide private sector led solutions to training of coastal flexible marine
cadres, to expedite the stabilisation of coastal communities in which pirates operate.
Regional authorities require, well trained, lightly armed and highly mobile cadres, supported
by sound human intelligence management would deliver the capacity to disrupt pirate action
groups on land. It would make it virtually impossible to bring or hide hostage seafarers
ashore with the impunity which pirates presently enjoy.
Regional Anti-Piracy Intelligence Co-ordination Centre:
Is it really necessary to build a separate operation in the Seychelles to gather evidence
against piracy kingpins?, whilst there are no funds for supporting policing of coastal
communities. This is an issue of mistaken priorities and an incoherent approach to tackling
the root causes of piracy. The root causes are not the payment of ransoms which are then
allegedly to be traced, but rather a lack of investment in policing of coastal communities on
land.
13.2 A substantial amount of the evidence necessary to support prosecutions of kingpins
already exists. Moreover AML regulations in most jurisdictions are sufficient to launch asset
seizure applications based on suspicion of illicit enrichment. The fact that Kenya where most
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of the piracy proceeds are laundered, has lax legal regimes and practices in respect of illicit
financial flows and financing of terrorism. Herein lies one of the biggest challenges to the
prospect of prosecuting alleged kingpins.
13.3 Whilst such prosecutions have been widely heralded, the reality on the ground is
altogether different. Despite the widely acknowledged involvement of officials in areas like
Puntland in piracy, it is to be noted that the ongoing rhetoric around illicit financial flows, are
beset by vast gaps in intelligence, and an inability to delineate and discriminate between
legitimate and illicit financial flows in the Somali commercial context. This explains to a large
degree why there have been few if any prosecutions in this area.
13.4 Again, to articulate the Somali perspective, the focus on illicit financial flows emanating
from Kidnap & Ransom payments, needs to be balanced by a focus on tracking the
substantially larger illicit finances of Illegal fishing fleets.
13.5 Picture the oft repeated scene if you will. Somali fishermen spotted by an IUUF vessel in
the same area, reporting pirate skiffs in action. The likelihood of being apprehended and
carted for trial in Kenya or the Seychelles on the basis of carrying Kalashnikovs is a very
prospect for Somali fishermen within their own EEZ or closer still on artisanal waters.
13.6 The point here is not to proffer the argument piracy arose from the fact that Somali
fishermen forced to take guns onboard tare compelled to
protect themselves from heavily armed fishing fleets from the EU and beyond.
13.7 It is more than the moral and ethical dimension that is missing from
Naval deployments to Somalia. The need to protect Somalis themselves from illegal fishing
and exploitation of resources.
13.8 Accelerate the proposed regional capacity. Re-establishing regional law
enforcement, judicial capacity and the rule of law as a paradigm of stable governance for
Somali coastal regions and beyond.
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Arrangements for the prosecution, defence & transfer of alleged pirates must
meet internationally acceptable standards as defined by the United Nations
Undersecretary for Legal Affairs. The British diaspora, has a key role to play in this regard, in
supplying UK trained Somali lawyers to assist the regional states and international agencies
to undertake more expedite prosecutions.
Widen the operational mandate of Operation Atalanta, CTF-150 & CTF-151 to
include surveillance, logging and interdiction of potentially illegal fisheries vessels
operating within the proximity of the EEZ. This must mandate protocols for Supplying such
data to prosecuting authorities, competent local and regional enforcement authorities, and
Somali civil society organisations, to pursue civil actions on behalf of victims.
Maritime War risks insurance industry to contribute more substantially to UN
Piracy Trust Fund, from the windfall profits of piracy premiums, to strengthen policing,
law enforcement legal and judicial capacity in coastal communities.
The British diaspora, is a principle stakeholder, in the success of the transitional
arrangements. More efforts must be made by HMG, the UN and state and non
state actors to scale up the capacity of the Anglo Somali diaspora, to find a
meaningful role (at observer status) in substantive discussions pertinent Anglo Somali
diasporas. Challenging as this may seem, it is not beyond our collective wit.
The Council of Somali Organisations stands ready to assist, utilising its best offices, efforts
and endeavours to progressively support the Somali people, HMG and the international
community.
Appendix 1
BRIEFING NOTE
FISHING FOR PEACE
CEELDARAD FISHING CO. LTD
This briefing note has been prepared for the attention of the FCO Maritime and Security
Team, Directorate for Defence and International Security, to address a number of questions
put forward by the department regarding the Ceeldarad Fishing Co. Ltd,. These are as follows;
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UNDER WHAT ORGANISATION IS THIS BEING RUN? I HAD THE
IMPRESSION THAT IT WAS NOT A COUNCIL OF SOMALI
ORGANISATIONS INITIATIVE PER SE.
Ceeldarad Fishing Co. Ltd19, is purely a private sector initiative, which the Council of Somali
Organisations is supporting. Having been approached for advice and assistance with the
initiative, I have offered legal advice and guidance to the directors in dealing with suppliers
and customers in the UK and overseas, eg developing standard terms of business and other
contractual documents.
I WAS IMPRESSED TO SEE THAT SUCH LARGE AMOUNTS OF MONEY
HAD ALREADY BEEN INVESTED. COULD YOU SAY FROM WHERE THE
FUNDS ORIGINATED?
In short the sources of funding emanate from the personal savings of the investors (there are
presently 10 shareholders who have invested funds in the initiative. A fair slice of the funding
consists of contributions in kind. The investors have contributed over two years of their
professional time to get the business off the ground, the financial value of this contribution is
included in the overall investment made.
For example land purchased for the business in Berbera and offices in Hargeisa, has also
appreciated in value. Some of the funds were raised using traditional pooled savings
mechanisms including the “Hagbad”. This is an indigenous financial savings, investments and
loans instrument, offering a facility to raise interest free capital funds based on a strong
model of Trust and organised along close kinship lines to mitigate risks.
However of the total sums invested approximately some $300k to $400k constituted liquid
funds, required to fund the purchase of capital equipment, and logistical expenses.
The absence of formal banking arrangements in Somaliland remains a challenge, and the bulk
of capital investment, particularly in equipment (commissioning a new trawler, and
19 Ceeldaraad, (Pronounced in English with a silent C) translates into Somali as “Born/Out of Frustration”
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refrigerated vans and lorries, generators for Ice making plant etc was conducted via credit
swaps through Hawalas in Somaliland and Dubai), enabling the procurement of material
required for the business.
HOW IS THE FUNDING AUDITED? ARE THERE ANY FINANCIAL
DOCUMENTS THAT YOU MIGHT BE ABLE TO SHARE WITH US?
In terms of auditing, I have instructed an accountant on behalf of the company, to support
the directors in establishing the necessary processes to facilitate a proper audit at the
appropriate stage of the statutory financial reporting cycle.
I have no instructions at present to disclose any confidential information regarding the
business. If however you could explain the rationale for this, who would see the information
(I have a reasonable idea but would need this further clarified for the benefit of the
directors).
I have advised the directors on a number of regulatory matters including the importance of
establishing robust AML and related controls assurance measures. I have assisted them with
respect to securing compliance with FATF requirements, and this has resulted in a board
decision to formally register the business in the UK, to enhance the transparency of the
business. Accordingly, I have helped set up a UK based company as a vehicle to ensure that
financial flows generated through the business are subject to UK auditing and standard
accounting practice. This is part of a series of measures which are being implemented to
ensure compliance with UK legislative requirements and best practice in terms of financial
probity.
DO YOU HAVE RECORDS OF THE OUTCOMES OF THE TRAINING YOU
OFFER? IS THERE EVIDENCE TO SHOW THE IMPACT OF THE WORK AT
ALL? I CERTAINLY DON’T DOUBT THAT SUCH TRAINING HAS THE
POTENTIAL TO BE VERY USEFUL, BUT IT WOULD BE INTERESTING TO
SEE THE WAYS IN WHICH IT IS HAVING AN IMPACT. ALTERNATIVELY IF
I DIDN’T UNDERSTAND FULLY AND THE TRAINING IS STILL IN A
PLANNING STAGE, THEN IT WOULD BE HELPFUL TO HAVE A BETTER
IDEA OF HOW YOU ENVISAGE THIS WORKING.
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The training is very much at a nascent stage, and formal evaluation of the outcomes built into
the process if resources permit. The impact of the training will it is expected inspire practical
change in behavioural norms, which will undermine the recruitment of young people into
piracy. However advanced discussions have taken place with the political leadership and
security officials of Galmudug and Gul Hiraan & Haradhere. Whilst almost all of the principle
ports used by the most active pirates action groups are based in these two administrative
districts which are aspiring mini political states in the Somali transitional process.
Initial mapping of vocational training on the coastline (virtually non existent) led to
discussions including extensive dialogue with civil society organisations active across the
whole of the former Somali Republic, including Somaliland.
The Council of Somali Organisations has been asked to facilitate this dialogue. Accordingly
with directors of the company, visits have been made in 2011 & 2012 to Hargeisa, Nairobi,
Mombassa, Arusha, Addis Abbaba, Djibouti and Mogadisho.
Between March 2012 & May 2012, the Council of Somali Organisations specifically visited
detention facilities & courts in Mombassa and held discussions with both the ILO (Paul
Crook Chief Technical Adviser) and on how they can contribute to training provision and
emergency employment and vocational training initiatives in the regions most affected by
piracy). Further discussions of a similar nature took place in Addis Abbaba with Somaliland,
EU and IGAD security sector officials.
The CSO, also meet the East Africa UNDOC Special Representative Ms. Loide Lungameni
and other senior UNDOC officials vis the role of diaspora led initiatives in this area. In terms of
rehabilitation of convicted pirates and the standard patent unfairness of many piracy trial
procedures, meant that discussions with UNADOC were broadly speaking a wholly unedifying
experience.
I have through the CSO mobilised a network of contacts, and thereby assisted the directors of
Ceeldarad Fishing Co. Ltd, by identifying credible and effective NGO partners on the ground who are
interested in supporting this initiative. This has enabled the company to establish dialogue and
partnerships. Some of those groups are as follows.
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The Observatory of Conflict and Violence Prevention which operates across the Somali region
http://www.somalipeacebuilding.org/.
I have also assisted the directors in negotiations with a Somalifairfishing.com, a Danish NGO. This
culminated in a fact finding visit to Hargeisa and Berbera, and current offers of technical and
possibly financial support for the initiative. The Council of Somali Organisations has also put the
directors of Ceeldaraad Fishing Company Ltd, in touch with a youth led civil society organisation
(which are members of the CSO) who may be amongst the first beneficiaries of the proposed
training.
The group called Ururrka Baadbadinta Xeebha (an NGO formed in the principle Pirate ports, by
young Somalis opposed to piracy and actively involved in supplying food, medicine, intercession and
pastoral support to those kidnapped by pirates and held in the region. This is a largely unheralded
initiative taking place in a dangerous environment and inspired by the revulsion of coastal
communities regarding piracy and hostage taking in particular.
HOW DO YOU ENVISAGE THIS WORKING
To fully appreciate the context of this initiative, it is necessary to take a dual view of the
proposed values & benefits which inform this approach.
BENEFITS:
1. Alternate livelihoods to undermine the piracy business model
In specific terms , the beneficiaries will be those who undertake such vocational training, and
are able to put into practice in terms of developing alternate livelihoods
2. INSPIRATIONAL (undermining the piracy business model)
One of the three fundamental precepts for the work of the Council of Somali Organisations
(Inspire – Represent - Integrate) is the need to inspire behavioural change in key areas.
Accordingly the greatest single contribution that this initiative can make will be to inspire
Somali coastal communities to replicate success. This is an incredibly powerful tool for
driving social and political change in Somalia. The propensity for commercial imitation is a
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strong driver of Somali entrepreneurship. Initiatives which can be seen to work are very
quickly imitated, and this to some degree explains the preponderance of Remittance and
Telecoms businesses across all Somali diasporas.
Fundamentally, this initiative has significant potential to be replicated across the entire Somali
littoral, from Djibouti, & Berbera in Somaliland to Kismayo in South Central and all ports in
between.
PROPOSED CONTENTS OF TRAINING
SHORE BASED TRAINING
- Emergency Vocational Training: Identifying and working with the coastal communities whose
young people are most vulnerable to being seduced by & inducted into the Piracy Business
Model. This will involve establishing some home truths /dispelling myths about the fortunes
of piracy. This would include some tuition around the numbers drowned and missing at say
and those killed by other pirates and international forces, as well as the numbers facing long
sentences in foreign and local penal institutions. Addressing the cultural religious, ethical and
legal implications of piracy would also be delivered by and with local elders and rehabilitated
pirates.
- Understanding of the alternate, safer and lucrative opportunities available in artisanal and
commercial fishing. Including some of the financial facts and figures to assist comparison of
- risks to rewards and thus undermining the piracy business model, by promoting viable and
objectively verifiable next best alternative livelihoods.
MARITIME TRAINING
Vocational training around technical aspects of fishing and fish processing techniques,
consideration of packaging, sales and marketing of produce. Developing local cooperatives to
pool local resources to purchase necessary equipment to develop onshore and coastal
aquaculture and to repair existing vessels.
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How would you envisage rolling out further help to re-habilitate convicted pirates? / How
might you see this being implemented in different countries? / What is your expected
outcome of this, especially in relation to pirates who are convicted for a number of years in
third countries.
Convicted pirates are a specific target group for rehabilitation. I have had initial discussions
with the Somalialnd Counter Piracy Unit, and Ministers of Interior & Minister of Justice (Mr.
Mahamoud Araleh, Hussein Aideed), as well as Prof. Muhydin of the TFG Counter Piracy
Task Force, with a view to offering rehabilitation support for pirates convicted therein.
The company with the assistance of the Council of Somali Organisations has also visited
Mombassa, to see rehabilitation workshops in furniture making which is currently offered to
some of those convicted in Kenya.
In terms of how this would work in different countries, Ceeldaraad Fishing Company
Ltd, would in partnership with those interested state parties (countries detaining
pirates), deliver programmes of training which will meet the specific needs and
capacity of that state.
Scaling up this initiative to cover other states would depend on the profitability of the
primary fisheries business.
Obviously the role of NSAs such as the UNDP and the various UN Trust Funds
pertinent to this area, as well as the EU and state actors has to date not resulted in
any work specific to this area.
The directors of Ceeldaraad Fishing Company Ltd, are infact delivering privately on
the issues which those institutions have committed themselves to publicly. The extent
of impact and progress the company is able to make in this regard is to contribute
vision, leadership and an innovative model for delivery.
I have also organised the attendance of a number of the directors, at the margins of a
Chatham House meeting on Illegal and Unregulated Fishing in February 2012. Contact
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was made, and informal discussions took place with a Lt Col Michael Rosette, Deputy
Chief Of Staff. Seychelles people’s defence forces / Commander of the Seychellois
Coast Guard with a view to discussions around rehabilitation. This was however very
much dependant on other states agreeing terms for the repatriating of convicted
pirates which was an issue at that point. Additional dialogue was also initiated with
the US National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration who lead on fisheries
matters on behalf of the US department of Commerce.
In terms of how I see this being rolled out. Clearly a series of agreements with detaining authorities
on the modalities around rehabilitation of pirates at various stages of the detention cycle would need
to be implemented at the appropriate stage. This would include
with the government of the Seychelles, Kenya, Mauritius and other detaining states including in the
EU, India, Oman & South Korea. It would be essential for convicted pirates to personally agree to
participate in such rehabilitation programmes.
Fishing for Peace v. Regional Capacity
As a private initiative, the shareholders are planning to invest some 10 % of profits into a corporate
citizenship programme, one element of which they have named “Fishing for Peace”. It is possible
that the insurance and shipping industry as well as interested state parties may be approached in
due course to sponsor the training and or to match fund the investment made by the company.
Despite the fact that this will in the medium term grow into a substantial financial commitment, it is
not possible or indeed appropriate for the shareholders to subsidise regional requirement for
sustained capacity support in respect to regeneration & rehabilitation of both coastal communities
and convicted pirates.
Fishing for Peace is a model for the peaceable regeneration of poor rural communities. It can provide
transformative inspirational leadership and direction to the local and international community with
respect to undermining the Somali Piracy model, and in developing more beneficial developmental
trajectories and narratives for the region.
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Having organised press releases and disseminated same, to a number of interested parties, including
UK & EU parliamentarians, it is likely that substantial media and press interest may be generated
by this initiative.
The Council of Somali Organisations is dealing with all such enquiries and related public affairs
matters. Some of these enquiries may ultimately come back to HMG with respect to requests for
comments from the relevant ministers. I hope that this note therefore serves as a bit of a heads up
for the FCO in this regard.
July 2012
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Department for International Development – Oral evidence (QQ109
– 175)
Evidence Session No. 4. Heard in Public. Questions 109 - 175
THURSDAY 21 JUNE 2012
Members present
Lord Teverson (Chairman)
Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury
Baroness Eccles of Moulton
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Henig
Lord Inge
Lord Jay of Ewelme
Lord Jopling
Lord Radice
Lord Williams of Elvel
Baroness Young of Hornsey
________________
Examination of Witnesses
Nick Pickard, Head of Security Policy, Foreign and Commonwealth Office; Nick Kay,
Africa Director, Foreign and Commonwealth Office; and Rachel Turner, Director, East
and Central Africa, Department for International Development.
Q109 The Chairman: I am just going to welcome Mr Zahrani, who is from the Tanzanian
High Commission and who is sitting in. We are very pleased that you are able to join the
public session. If I can just go through the normal notices, this is a public session, and we will
be recording the session. There will be a transcript. We will give you a copy of that and that
will allow you to make any amendments where we have made factual errors. Perhaps just to
put some context into it, this is our second evidence session looking at Operation Atalanta,
but the broader EU reaction to the situation in the Horn of Africa generally. This is a short
report that we are doing, and this is the last of the verbal evidence sessions.
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Perhaps what I could ask you to do first of all is just to introduce yourselves for those that
do listen to the webcast at some point and then we will move into questions and go through
the issues. I think you are fairly aware of what we are going to ask. But perhaps if we could
go from left to right from where I am.
Nick Pickard: I am Nick Pickard. I head up the Security Policy Department in the Foreign
Office.
Nick Kay: I am Nick Kay. I am the director for Africa in the Foreign Office.
Rachel Turner: I am Rachel Turner. I am the director for East and Central Africa in DFID
since Monday.
Q110 The Chairman: We will particularly look to you, Rachel, for the answers with a
fresh mind. Perhaps I could start off and really get to the bottom of the history, if you like,
and ask you how well Operation Atalanta has performed in the last two years? What have
been the main achievements and what have been the problems in combating piracy? We will
go through that and then we can move on to some of the other issues that come out of that.
Nick Pickard: We think that the operation has been very successful. Let us just remember
that its original mandate was to protect World Food Programme shipping to allow it to
reach Somalia. It has escorted 159 World Food Programme ships successfully and 126
AMISOM ships have been escorted. So in terms of its core mandate it has been very
effective. None of those has been affected by piracy. It has also had a significant impact on
piracy itself. I think the Minister gave you some figures at the last session, but the figures are
that 47 ships were pirated in 2010 and 19 last year in 2011. This year––we are only half way
through the year––only five ships have been pirated in six months, which is a significant drop
on the levels we were at a couple of years ago.
The Gulf of Aden in particular, which is the main trade artery, of course, through which so
much of our trade goes, is largely secure. What is interesting to me is that unsuccessful
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attacks have also come down significantly. There were 101 unsuccessful attacks in 2011 and
only 25 so far this year. So pirates are not only not succeeding in their attacks but there are
actually fewer attacks as well.
I think the operation has been effective as well in the way in which it has worked with other
international partners, be that NATO, the coalition ships, and ships from a number of other
navies––China, Japan, India and others. The way in which those have worked as part of an
overarching security force has been very impressive. The way in which the operation has
been part of a broader comprehensive approach to try to tackle piracy has also been
impressive, with attempts to attack every part of the piracy business model.
Why has this happened? Part of it is as a result of the military presence, part of it is better
adherence to the best management practices by industry and part of it is the use of armed
guards on ships.
You asked about the problems, Lord Teverson, of combating piracy. I think the largest
problem is the size of the area. You could fit the entire continental Europe into the high-risk
area, and even if you had the whole world’s naval assets, it would be difficult to cover that
sort of territory adequately. The adaptability of the pirates has also been a problem. We
have seen their modus operandi change as we have attempted to confront it. And the
multifaceted approach: the fact that piracy has many different strands and we have got to try
to address them all. There are many different areas of the business model that we need to
attack.
This is not a problem as much as something to be proud of: but the standards that we
maintain also mean that we need to ensure, for example, that we collect sufficient evidence,
that we deal with pirates in a humane way, that the prisons and the prosecution systems are
all up to our standards, and that in itself has created a lot of work to ensure that we are able
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to do that. I am sure that unscrupulous operators would be able to deal with pirates in
different ways but we stand by the values that we need to abide by.
Q111 The Chairman: You mentioned as you went through the international effort and
how Atalanta and all the other partners and individual sovereign nations with navies have
worked together there. I just wonder whether you could give us a little bit of insight from
the Foreign Office’s point of view. It seems to me that in all the grief that there is in the
world and all the tensions this has been an area of enlightenment and international co-
operation that has worked very well. Does it have implications that spread out slightly from
the Indian Ocean in that area, or is just really something that has been useful, and when this
ends that will end?
Nick Pickard: That is a very interesting question. I think I would agree with you, Lord
Teverson, that this has been a very successful demonstration of international co-operation
through the various mechanisms, including the SHADE mechanism in Bahrain. I think we do
want to find a way of bottling that and making sure that we can use it in future. I think it has,
for example, opened the eyes of the Chinese and Indian navies as to how we can co-operate.
I think they arrived in the area expecting to do things on their own and they discovered
through experience that international co-operation was a much more effective way of
achieving it and they have been very open to that. I think the co-operation between the EU
and NATO, which I have discussed with this Committee many times in the past, has also
been very effective at the theatre level, and it is something that we need to build on.
Q112 The Chairman: Mr Kay, was there anything you wanted to add to that at all?
Nick Kay: No, no, not at all. I think as Nick says, it is an interesting question which we are
reflecting upon as we look at other theatres where there is a shared common international
interest that spans all our traditional and non-traditional partners.
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Q113 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: You mentioned the pirates and
operational change. There have been a couple of well-publicised examples of people being
snatched from countries rather than ships being taken. Is it a concern that this particular
tactic is going to be pursued more?
Nick Pickard: Yes, naturally the pirates are making a lot of money, or the kingpins behind it
are making a lot of money, so as we close down one route to them making money they are
clearly going to try to find other ways of making that money. That is a concern. We are
attacking it in two ways: first, by trying to provide alternative livelihoods for people in
Somalia, on which others no doubt can talk later, and secondly, through the RAPPICC, the
Regional Anti-Piracy Prosecutions and Intelligence Co-ordination Centre—I think I have the
acronym right—that we are setting up in the Seychelles, which is actually aiming to put
together evidence packages to get at the very kingpins, i.e. the key organised criminals to be
honest, who are making the most money.
Q114 Lord Radice: Is it the policy of HMG and obviously the European Union to rid the
Indian Ocean of pirates or merely to contain the piracy?
Nick Pickard: I have no doubt that their ultimate goal is to rid piracy, just as our ultimate
goal is to rid the country of organised crime. But that is clearly a very long term goal and,
therefore, we have to go about it in a way that allows us first to minimise it, and as the only
solution to eradicating it will be on land, and that is, as you know, a very long term goal. But
it is one that we hope to achieve eventually of course.
Q115 Lord Inge: From what you said, we identified certain capability gaps in the past. I
am talking about aerial surveillance, medical and more effective tankers to support the
operation. Are you saying that those capability gaps have been filled, or are you saying that
actually they are just operating more effectively?
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Nick Pickard: The capability gaps have by and large been filled. It has peaks and troughs as
different assets become available from different countries. But at the moment Atalanta has all
the maritime patrol and reconnaissance aircraft that it requires for its needs, and it has an
auxiliary oiler replenisher––a tanker used for refuelling––which I know was a concern of the
Committee in its previous report. There is now one available for the operation. I think there
is a short capability gap in Medical Role 2 facilities but that is going to be filled within the
next few weeks so as far as I am aware the operation commander is content with the—
Q116 Lord Inge: There are no other capability gaps that you think exist?
Nick Pickard: As far as I am aware the operation commander is content. He certainly has
not come calling, as the Minister said at his evidence session.
Q117 Lord Inge: Is the World Food Programme using more effective ships, if you like?
Nick Pickard: It is. It has chartered what they call a time charter vessel, which essentially
shuttles back and forth between the various ports. By using that vessel the EU has been able
to embark on autonomous vessel protection detachment which saves us from having to use
the frigates to escort that vessel alongside. So, yes, improved shipping is being used by the
World Food Programme.
Q118 Lord Inge: What about the attitude to the insurance agencies; for example, armed
guards and things like that? Has that changed, or is that just what it used to be?
Nick Pickard: We are encouraged by the efforts of the shipping and the insurance industries
to ensure that best management practice is maintained.
Q119 Lord Inge: What do you mean by best management practice?
Nick Pickard: There is a guide, quite a slim guide, produced, which is called Best
Management Practice, which is issued to all shipping companies and it guides them in taking
certain measures that reduce the risk from piracy; for example, by having higher sides to the
ships, by ensuring that they have citadels, manoeuvring in certain ways or using certain
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routes. All of those cost more so some of the less scrupulous companies are reluctant to
use them. But around 70% of ships use these self-protection measures and I think it goes up
to 92% when you talk about UK flagged shipping, which is a significant improvement and the
risks of piracy to those vessels is significantly reduced. Many fewer vessels taking the best
management practice are pirated.
Q120 The Chairman: Do you feel the insurance industry is being responsible? I think
you used the words “we are encouraged by the efforts” which strike me as FCO speak for
“we are mildly disappointed” probably, but I do not know. Tell me, because we were pretty
disappointed the last time we looked at this that, although they were paying out these big
amounts of money, they were 0.111% of their total gross revenue and frankly it was not
something worth worrying about.
Nick Pickard: We have work to continue to do. Certainly 70% is not 100% and we would
like to get it to 100%, but I think particularly the industry in London and elsewhere is making
significant efforts to combat this problem, which affects it of course significantly.
Q121 Lord Williams of Elvel: Do insurers still insure ransoms?
Nick Pickard: Yes.
Q122 Lord Jay of Ewelme: Just following up one point from Lord Inge, is it possible for
us to have a copy of the Best Management Practice guide? I would find it quite useful just to
look at it.
Nick Pickard: Certainly. We will provide it.
Q123 Lord Jay of Ewelme: I just wanted to ask a couple of questions about armed
guards. You said earlier on that the provision of armed guards is one of the factors that had
led to the reduction in the success of piracy. This is something we looked at when we
looked at this issue the first time around. What led the Government to move to a position
in which it would permit armed guards onto ships? You have described clear advantages
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from that. Are there any disadvantages as well which have come up as a result of that
decision? It clearly seems a right decision. We will stop there for the moment.
Nick Pickard: The Government decided to review its policy because it is important that we
keep our policies under review and we wanted to look at every possible way in which we
could try to reduce the threat of piracy. Essentially it was a risk evaluation case and we
decided that the evidence that demonstrated that armed guards on ships would significantly
reduce successful attacks was comprehensive and conclusive. The Department for Transport
led that review, working closely with industry and other Government departments. Since
then no ship that has had armed guards on it has been successfully pirated.
The evidence demonstrates, I think, that it has had a significant effect on the ability of piracy.
There certainly are risks and one of the reasons the Government originally did not support
this policy was the concern that either pirates would adapt their tactics to use more
violence to try to overcome the armed guards, and secondly, that there might be a risk,
therefore, to the ship crew or the ship or innocent parties as a result of that increasing
violence. It is also quite a complex legal area because many different jurisdictions apply when
you are on the high seas and so it is very difficult to determine exactly the impact, for
example, if such an incident were to occur.
But the evidence so far suggests that actually pirates have been sufficiently deterred by
armed guards so as to not attack or to try to use increased levels of violence. So we need
clearly to keep that under review but at the moment we are confident that that policy has
been welcomed and has been working.
I should note that the policy is that we should use private armed guards only in exceptional
circumstances and when it is lawful to do so. So it is for—
Q124 Lord Jay of Ewelme: What does that mean?
Nick Pickard: Well, for example, ships—
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Lord Jay of Ewelme: It is quite interesting what you have said so far, that the practical
advantages of this, which are clearly very considerable, outweigh the potential legal
difficulties when it comes to making a decision, which is a good commonsense and rather
British approach to legal difficulties that might arise. But what exactly do you mean when you
say it can be used only in exceptional circumstances and when it is legal to do so?
Nick Pickard: We mean within the high-risk area, for example: we are not suggesting that
ships all around the world should start having armed guards on them. And only ships of a
certain tonnage or above: we are not suggesting that leisure or passenger craft, should they
start using the high-risk area, have armed guards on to provide protection. So we are not
looking for a great increase in the number of weapons in the area; we are talking about
specific ships which are likely to be in a high-risk environment and need to use that area.
Q125 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: Presumably, conversely, all ships that have been
pirated recently, and the number is very low, did not have armed guards on them?
Nick Pickard: Correct.
Q126 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: We are not talking just about ships flying the UK
flag, are we? We are talking about all ships?
Nick Pickard: Yes, this is the total. There are only five ships - in the Indian Ocean - five
ships of any flags have been pirated.
Q127 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: So we are not the only people who have armed
guards on our ships?
Nick Pickard: Indeed, a number of countries have had armed guards on their ships for some
time. This was about changing Government policy with regard to UK-flagged ships.
Baroness Eccles of Moulton: Thank you.
The Chairman: I have a number of people who want to ask supplementaries on this. Lord
Foulkes.
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Q128 Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: You have said there may be dangers in certain
jurisdictions. Is there a danger of one of the armed guards being prosecuted for a crime,
because of shooting a pirate, if it was in the jurisdiction of an unhelpful country?
Nick Pickard: Yes, there is that risk. We have an incident at the moment whereby two
Italian military personnel are being charged in India because of shooting two Indian fishermen
in error in an incident that happened earlier this year. So there is indeed that risk.
Q129 Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: How can we avoid that and advise them and help
them to make sure that all European guards are not prosecuted; or if they are prosecuted,
what kind of help do we give them? Do we provide legal assistance and look after them?
Otherwise they are very vulnerable.
Nick Pickard: We are looking to the international community to bring together standards,
which the International Standards Organisation is going to draw up, to help us navigate what
is a very complex legal area. It will be drawing on some work that the International Maritime
Organisation has already been undertaking.
Q130 Lord Williams of Elvel: The guidance which has been issued by the Department
for Transport lays down some quite stringent conditions for private security companies. It
also lays down very astringent conditions for actually using these firearms in practice. It
points out for UK flagged ships that the use of these firearms is equivalent to the use of
firearms on the mainland of the United Kingdom. How many times in the past year have
armed guards actually opened fire on pirates?
Nick Pickard: I am afraid I do not know the answer to that question. I would have to get
you an answer. But as Captain Reindorp, who spoke to you at a previous session, said, by
and large they have not had to fire; merely the pointing of the gun or the presence of the
armed guards has been sufficient. I do not, I am afraid, know the exact answer.
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Q131 Lord Radice: Can we have a copy of the new guidance that you are issuing for
private armed guards?
The Chairman: We have it here. We circulated it only today.
Lord Radice: Sorry. That is why I have not read it.
Q132 Lord Jopling: I would like to come back to Lord Jay’s question about exceptional
circumstances. It is very easy to suppose that the only place that piracy is going on in the
world is off the Horn of Africa. Do you include within exceptional circumstances West
Africa and the Strait of Malacca, where there is significant piracy going on as well, as you
probably know?
Nick Pickard: I would need to check the answer to that but I am pretty confident that the
guidance applies across the globe. So it is in all areas where there is an exceptionally high
risk of piracy. I am told I am wrong on that, I do apologise. It is explicitly for that high-risk
area, but that is the only high-risk area that has been denoted. So if a high-risk area was
denoted in another area—
Q133 Lord Jopling: If you wanted to extend to, for instance, West Africa and the Strait of
Malacca, what would be the process? Do you have to get parliamentary approval? Do you
have to have secondary legislation to do this?
Nick Pickard: Again I would have to get back to you on that, I apologise. I do not know
how high-risk areas are designated but I am confident that if a high risk was designated in
another part of the world, this guidance would apply equally to that area.
Q134 Lord Jopling: But does a Minister have to sign something? What is the process?
Nick Pickard: I will inform you.
Q135 The Chairman: Just to tie up on this area, in terms of when these vessels come
into port and have firearms on board, does that cause any issues in any way? The other thing
I just wanted to follow up—I think it came out in the recent House of Commons debate––is
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that there was a different interpretation between Scottish law and English law as to how you
should use arms and this was seen as being a potential issue. This struck me as being quite
strange if you did not know what jurisdiction you were acting under as an individual on a
British vessel.
Nick Pickard: The Department for Transport would be the best people to answer the
specific legal question as they are those who are responsible for putting the guidance
together. But I have just been informed, very helpfully, that on the high-risk area the Lloyd’s
Joint War Committee would declare a high-risk area so it is their responsibility to do so.
Q136 The Chairman: So we need to refer to the Department for Transport further on?
Nick Pickard: It has responsibility for pulling all that guidance together.
The Chairman: That is fine.
Q137 Lord Jay of Ewelme: Just one other question I was going to ask. You have told us
quite clearly that the incidents of piracy have gone down, so what happens when the
Operation Atalanta’s mandate ends in 2014? Are the pirates just waiting for that and then
they start again, or is there going to be some rollover or some continuation? What happens
in the long and sort of medium term?
Nick Pickard: Operation Atalanta has had its mandate rolled over, I think, in two-year
periods since it began in 2008.
Q138 Lord Jay of Ewelme: There is a presumption that that will continue, is there?
Nick Pickard: It would clearly be decided nearer the time but there is a review about six
months prior to a mandate requiring to be renewed, when we look at the state and decide
whether or not the EU should continue that practice. Clearly it is not a long-term goal to
have naval assets tied up in the Indian Ocean for ever, which is why we are tackling piracy on
land as well, as the causes of the piracy. But for the time being I think the need is evident.
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Q139 Lord Jopling: Can we now turn to what you do with pirates when you have
captured them? I am going to ask a narrow question about prosecution and we will come on
to what you do with them after sentencing in a moment. After the London Conference how
many countries have said that they will take pirates for prosecution, and how confident are
you that those who have promised will actually do something about it? So often at these
conferences people say yes, yes, and when it comes to action it is no, no.
Nick Pickard: We already have a memorandum of understanding with the Seychelles that
we have been using, so there is no doubt they are doing something about it. We have a
memorandum of understanding with Tanzania that we signed at the London Conference, so
they have explicitly done something about it as well. We had an agreement at the London
Conference to negotiate an MOU with Mauritius and we have now negotiated and signed
that agreement as well, so Mauritius have also done something about it.
We have signed a regional burden sharing agreement with Kenya and we are working
towards negotiating an MOU with them as well. So we have bilateral agreements with three
countries so far and we are working on a fourth in the region. The EU also has an agreement
with the Seychelles and it is in the final stages of negotiating agreements with Tanzania and
with Mauritius as well.
Q140 Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: I get the impression maybe that the Seychelles are
taking a rather excessive part of the burden. Do you think that the other countries are
lagging a wee bit and should be encouraged so that the Seychelles do not have such a heavy
burden?
Nick Pickard: That was one of the reasons that we encouraged the four countries together
at a meeting hosted by Minister Bellingham in the margins of the London Conference on
Somalia to sign a regional burden sharing agreement––a statement or declaration––whereby
they would work together on this issue that affects them all. I think we have seen through
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the Tanzania and Mauritius action since then and indeed the Kenya action––although they
are coming up to elections, they are working on this internally at the moment—that these
countries are stepping up to meet that need.
Q141 Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: We heard the numbers from the Seychelles––quite
large numbers––but how do the numbers prosecuted by other countries compare?
Nick Pickard: I do not know the exact numbers but the MOU for Seychelles is longer
standing so in terms of our pirates that we capture naturally there is a longer history there.
We did have an MOU with Kenya until 2010, so they have also been prosecuting a number
of pirates. I think the issue with the countries in the region is that they are happy to play
their part in prosecuting pirates, but what they do not want is to find their prisons full of
Somali pirates for many years. So one of the key aspects to delivering their support has been
to try to create this conveyor belt whereby we capture the pirates, we hand them over for
prosecution in the region but then we are able to move them back to Somalia for
imprisonment. It has been those agreements that we have been putting in place and the
prisons that we have been building in Somaliland and Puntland are going to enable us to build
support for further prosecutions in the region.
Q142 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: I think the first part of my question has
already been answered but the second part is: how sensible and successful is incarcerating
pirates in Somalia and, indeed, Somaliland and Puntland but in particular Somalia?
Nick Pickard: So far the transfer agreements have been with Somaliland and Puntland,
though the Puntland one has not yet come into operation because we are still building the
prison capacity there through the UN. On Somaliland, we had our first transfer from the
Seychelles of 17 pirates to a UNODC refurbished prison in Hargeisa in March and so they
are now successfully incarcerated in Somaliland.
Q143 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: They are still there?
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Nick Pickard: They are certainly still there, yes.
Q144 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: But Somaliland and Puntland, in a way,
one can understand more, but actually sending them back to Somalia seems to be potentially
asking for trouble––asking for them just to be sprung and back to pirating?
Nick Pickard: Nick may want to comment on the conditions in Mogadishu, Somalia. I think
the security has improved significantly in there but at the moment we are focused on
Somaliland and Puntland, as you say, which are the best prospects for being able to provide
that sort of capacity.
Nick Kay: Absolutely.
Q145 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: So at what point will it be practically
sensible to send pirates to Somalia?
Nick Kay: Goodness knows, you would need a very sort of powerful crystal ball to give an
accurate answer to that. I think certainly until we get to the other side of August and the
setting up of new institutions, new presidency, parliament and so on, then I think some way
down the road that those new institutions build some capacity. I would not see it as likely
very soon. Not this year, I would say. The security situation: I think we are coming to it
later.
Q146 The Chairman: Can I just get some further clarity? Is the agreement for these
effectively with the semi-autonomous regional authorities, or is it with the transitional
Government in Somalia? Can we just absolutely be clear who is running the prisons and who
provides the guards and the finance? Is it a completely United Nations operation or is the
agreement with a regional province of Somaliland? Perhaps you could just explain those nuts
and bolts to us.
Nick Pickard: The prisons are refurbished or built by the UNODC and then it acts
essentially as mentors for the running of the prisons. So it is partly about building regional
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capacity to allow the region to take responsibility for those issues itself. The guards and the
running of the prison are local but the UN provides the sort of overall confidence that it is
an effective operation and it mentors and manages the prisons overall as part of that
development project. But is very important, I think, that we encourage the region to be
building its own capacity—under international supervision of course—so that it can take
responsibility for these issues, and the Governments in question are keen to do so.
The Chairman: It is an agreement with the Somali transitional Government or with—
Nick Pickard: The transfer agreement with the Seychelles is between the Seychelles and
Somaliland specifically.
Q147 Lord Jopling: I would like to know more about the prisons that have been built.
How many prisons? How many inmates can they take? What are the security arrangements?
I, first of all, find it astonishing that they should be going back to Somalia itself. When Lady
Kinnock came before this Committee two years ago she said that discussions were going on
then—if you go back to question 326—about whether convicted pirates should be
transferred back from Kenya to Somalia. It would seem insane to me to send them back
there knowing the state of anarchy in that country. We were told by Mr Chitiyo last week—
in answer to Lady Bonham-Carter and myself—that the guards at these prisons are not
armed. That again seems totally insane.
Nick Pickard: Somaliland is a relatively functioning state—Nick or Rachel may want to
comment—so I do not think we should be too dismissive of the quality or the capabilities of
the regional authorities in Somaliland, which is where we have sent our prisoners so far.
Nick Kay: As far as I am aware we are not sending prisoners back or contemplating
encouraging others to send prisoners back to Somalia; Somaliland and Puntland, yes. I may
be wrong on the Somalia point and I will let you know if I subsequently discover that we are
involved in encouraging people to send prisoners to Somalia. In the brief two months I have
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been in this job it has not come to my attention that we are doing that, and I think I would
be surprised, because I would share Lord Jopling’s view that it is unlikely that conditions
within Somalia would be secure enough to do that.
Q148 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: This is really a comment and then a question, the
comment being that the closer to your home that you are held in prison there is an
increasing humanitarian point in that. Also, if you have prosecuted and convicted criminals,
let us say in Kenya, and you then have to hold them for a long time in your prisons, that is
obviously a big cost. So that was the comment. The question is: say you were to go on a visit
to one of these prisons––not that I am suggesting we would but just say we did––what
would we find? Would we find the sort of conditions that we would consider acceptable or
would we find that in a Horn of Africa prison there were conditions that we just could not
believe existed?
Nick Pickard: No, the prisons are being built to international standards by the UN and are
being monitored and mentored by the UN to international human rights standards.
Q149 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: Are they actually able to maintain a level of
monitoring and an insistence on the standards? If it is local staff, their whole attitude to life is
so very different.
Nick Pickard: The UN is very closely involved in managing these prisons and we have
provided significant amounts of money to help them do so. I think we have a lot of
confidence in the UN programme.
Q150 Lord Jay of Ewelme: Are we talking here just about prisons for the pirates? Are
there other prisons for ordinary criminal offences?
Nick Pickard: Yes, these are prisons specifically for pirates.
Q151 Lord Jay of Ewelme: Is there a real difference in quality between the prisons for
pirates under UN conditions and the prisons for everybody else in Somalia and Puntland?
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Nick Pickard: As I understand, there is, and that is a problem as well in the countries in the
region. One of the reasons they are concerned about having too many pirates within their
own countries is that there is a significant difference in standards.
Q152 Lord Inge: You are saying that the pirates live in different prisons. I want to be
absolutely clear on this?
Nick Pickard: The prisons that are being built by the UN are specifically for pirates. In the
Seychelles I have no doubt they are using the extant prison capacity they have, which is
pretty small given how small a nation it is.
Q153 Lord Jopling: Last week when we had the Foreign Minister of Seychelles in this
room, at question 12, he said this, and I quote: “The sentences are 10 to 15 years in general
and it makes much more sense that they are sent back to Somalia. This is also a way of
sending a clear message to pirates in Somalia that it does not pay, if they are actually held in
prisons in Somalia”.
Nick Pickard: By Somalia he means the whole country of Somalia, including Somaliland. We
recognise Somaliland to be part of Somalia but their agreement is with Somaliland. I can
assure you that they are not sending prisoners back to the part of Somalia which the
Transitional Federal Government has responsibility for.
Q154 Lord Williams of Elvel: Can we talk about the recent operation to attack a pirate
base on the Somali coast? Although this was much written up in the press we understand
that this was a very limited operation involving one helicopter, 70 rounds and lasted 17
seconds.
Nick Pickard: Correct.
Q155 Lord Williams of Elvel: So it was not a very big deal. What was the objective of
the operation and did the operation meet its objective? Is there any evidence that potential
pirates were put off by this or discouraged? What is your view?
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Nick Pickard: You are right. It was an operation that used limited military capability. That of
course is a good thing: the less military capability we can use to achieve an effect, the better.
Literally its aim was to destroy a number of boats and supplies in one pirate camp on the
beaches of Somalia. It had a more strategic aim, which was to demonstrate to pirates they
were not invulnerable on shore, as they had previously considered themselves to be. In that
I think it is too early to tell how effective it has been. The weather since the operation has
meant that we have not seen the extent to which pirates have adapted their tactics or how
they have changed. But the fact is that those boats and supplies that were provided by some
Somalian kingpin have not had the economic benefit which he was expecting from them and I
do not think they are very pleased about that.
Q156 Lord Williams of Elvel: We understand that the pirates actually in the base were
advised to leave before the operation took place. Is that right?
Nick Pickard: I cannot comment on detailed operational tactics, nor would it be my
responsibility. But certainly we were very clear before undertaking the operation that we
would not cause any human casualties.
Q157 The Chairman: What was the reaction locally to this operation? I think it cheered
all of us up in some way, but we are not the important players here. In terms of playing out
and providing a message, not just to the pirates, given that Somalia has a history of difficulties
in terms of foreign intervention, was it well received by the rest of the population?
Nick Pickard: I understand it was well received. It is something that the Transitional Federal
Government have been calling for as—
The Chairman: Yes, so it was an important point to make.
Q158 Lord Williams of Elvel: Was there any reaction from neighbouring countries?
Nick Pickard: Again, I think that was positive. I think the Seychelles Foreign Minister, when
he came to see you, also supported the operation.
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Q159 The Chairman: One bit we were not clear about last week was that we did have
some mention of more than one attack or attacks. I just wanted to be clear that there has
only been one.
Nick Pickard: The EU naval operation has only conducted one such attack, correct.
Q160 The Chairman: Have there been any others by any other operations?
Nick Pickard: Not that I am aware of, no.
The Chairman: Okay, thank you.
Q161 Baroness Young of Hornsey: Some say that piracy is an act of criminality and
should be treated absolutely as that in a kind of discrete way, whereas others would argue
that it is a symptom of a failed state and poverty and all the rest of it, and I think we sort of
tend towards the latter explanation, as it were. Can you say something about how effectively
you think the problems of Somalia itself have been addressed, particularly by the EU, and
what is the importance of the role of the EU in trying to sort out some of those issues and
to tackle them with development aid?
Nick Kay: I think that is broadening out the question towards our DFID colleague. Rachel
will be able to speak on the EU development programme in Somalia and I would be very
happy to speak more broadly on the political processes.
Rachel Turner: Shall we start on the development side? Broadly we think that the EU is a
very important partner in Somalia. I guess over the last few years it has been about the
second largest donor after the Americans and it has proved a good partner for the UK. The
way they have done their programming, we have found has been flexible and responsive to
the needs on the ground. Some of their programmes certainly have got a good reputation
for delivering results. They are the biggest donor working in economic infrastructure in
water––particularly in water supply they have played a critical role. Also in education, the EU
is the lead donor in the education sector and there are some quite good results in
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education. Although enrolment rates are extraordinarily low—it is very depressing when
you come to this job to read these statistics—the EU development programme has been
able to make a difference in education. Partly by being quite nimble, there are a lot of private
schools, it is a very ad hoc schooling process, they have had the flexibility to support the
education sector.
Of course, in humanitarian aid they have been a very significant player. ECHO, the EU
humanitarian agency, was absolutely critical to the response and remains critical and a big
funder. So broadly we do think that the EU development programme is doing a good job
given the challenges that we all face in terms of having to run the programmes from Nairobi
and having to work through other partners. But we are finding them good partners to work
with.
Q162 Baroness Young of Hornsey: Is there an expectation that the strategy will have
some sort of positive impact on the situation? Is there an expectation that piracy will be
diminished from this source as well as from the more obvious thing about arming ships and
so on?
Rachel Turner: There is, and certainly that trying to come at this from the issue of
opportunity for youth, jobs for youth, is a very important part of our programme and also of
the EU programme. So we are looking, for example, at how to get more labour intensive
ways into some of the construction work. We are looking at ways to open up agricultural
land to create more opportunities thereby, working with fishing communities. And the EU is
also an important player in the agriculture and livestock sectors. So absolutely that is very
much part of our overall strategy, and Nick will probably want to add to that, to try to
create opportunity and to quickly get in. I think one thing the London Conference did was to
say that all the international players need to be very nimble in getting into areas the
AMISOM have helped secure and open up, to get in very quickly with development support
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so people can see immediately the benefits of different ways of securing their livelihoods.
One of the key conclusions that came out of the London Conference was that we will need
to be a bit more flexible and nimble in getting into some of those opened up areas and,
again, we are working with the EU on that.
I think you know the EU’s strategy means they are coming to the end of the long seven year
strategy and they are just starting their new programming. So it is a good opportunity to
work with them as well now.
Q163 Baroness Young of Hornsey: Intuitively it feels like there will be that connection.
Do you have a methodology for evaluating that and measuring the extent to which it does
have an actual impact on the levels of criminality?
Rachel Turner: I do not know if we have got a methodology for exactly making the
connection between people who would have chosen piracy and are choosing to take other
routes to making their livelihoods. The gains are high from piracy. We have got increasingly
better methodologies for trying to see the impact of what we are trying to do: jobs created,
youth employment, youth livelihood strategies. Nick, do you want to add to that?
Nick Kay: The only thing I can think of is presumably one of our major indicators is the
drop in the number of pirate attacks and the incidents of piracy. If there are fewer people
taking to the seas and conducting these attacks then that is the effect that we are certainly
wanting to achieve. Cause and effect is more difficult to prove, but one would hope it is
because the balance of incentives versus other possibilities for earning a living on land has
changed.
Q164 Baroness Young of Hornsey: I do not want to harp on about the point, but I
think that what often happens is that people make an assertion that something has had an
impact or has been particularly effective without having some rigorous evidence to support
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that. So that is where I would be a bit concerned. We have methodologies for doing that in
other contexts and I am sure there would be ways of measuring that in a more direct way.
The other question I wanted to ask is about how the development and the humanitarian aid
is disbursed in Somalia. Who is responsible? What are the channels that it goes through?
Also how then do you get out of that? What is the exit strategy from that?
Rachel Turner: My understanding is that the EU programme is very similar to ours so it is
mainly disbursed through NGOs and non-state actors who are able and willing to operate in
the current security environment. They have been prepared to pay, for example, stipends
for the police and that I think was a very helpful offer from Europe that they were prepared
to do that, showing some flexibility. One issue that we are trying to move forward on is to
be able to do more private sector contracting to diversify the delivery mechanisms we can
use in Somalia. My understanding is that the EU institutions are not as far as advanced in
being able to do that as we are and that is something that we are talking to them about.
In terms of working directly with the authorities in Puntland and Somaliland, some of the
work that Europe is doing is close to the authorities. Some of the work they have done in
water, for example, has been done very closely with the municipalities. I guess the sort of
broader question of exit strategy from the way we are working now is very linked up to
what happens in August after the TFG. Nick might want to—
Q165 Baroness Young of Hornsey: Sorry, before you do, you said that the EU was a
little bit behind the UK. Could you just expand on what you meant by that?
Rachel Turner: Yes, I have just seen, in preparing myself for this, that in terms of being able
to directly contract with the private sector, it is a challenging thing to do and I think their
systems have not quite brought them to that point for certain types of programme.
Q166 The Chairman: Did you want to say anything on that side?
Nick Kay: No, I think that has covered the humanitarian and the—
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Q167 Lord Inge: We have all this training. Who is doing this training and do we have a
handle on monitoring what happens after they have been trained? Are we judging that or is it
Somalia who is telling us how they are doing or what?
Rachel Turner: The suppliers are a range of different non-government organisations. There
is the Danish Refugee Council and the International Committee of the Red Cross––those
sorts of organisations. We write into our agreements with them that they have to give us
very regular feedback on monitoring. My Secretary of State puts a lot of emphasis on
monitoring. He himself asks for very regular updates on performance and results. Most of
our programmes are long term so we are not trying to do short term things now. We are
trying to programme long term and allow ourselves the ability to monitor the long term
effects. It is difficult, though; the context is difficult.
Q168 The Chairman: Can I just bring up one of the things that concerns us now. In
terms of the development aid that goes on and the work of DFID and the European Union,
is the co-ordination good? Do 27 member states have their own individual work programme
there as well as the EU and the United States or whatever? Does it work as an international
community?
Rachel Turner: My sense is that in Nairobi it works well. Most people are running their
programmes from Nairobi and there are a lot of good structures in Nairobi. I do not know
whether this Committee has discussed some of the wider issues about sharing out sectors
between donors––something that the European institutions are very keen on. Some of those
issues are being handled well in Somalia. For example, we have agreed that we will focus on
health and the commission will focus on education. Some of those co-ordination issues are
working very well. On the ground, with different agencies working in the different regions,
there remains a challenge to co-ordinate all these different delivery agents.
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A lot of what we are trying to do is to build local capacity in some of these low level district
authorities so that they communicate with the suppliers, assert their priorities, and talk to
communities about priorities. It is a complex environment but I do sense that it is working
quite well in Nairobi. Often when one gets briefing on Europe it starts with a list of concerns
about issues that we are trying to push forward for reform. Actually, the briefing that has
come out of Nairobi about the role of European institutions in Somalia was very positive.
Q169 Lord Inge: Have you been to Somalia yourself?
Rachel Turner: I only started my job on Monday. It would be great and I know that our
Secretary of State feels that it is very important that we do get on the ground when we can.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: We should commend Rachel for the quality of her answers
after a few days.
Rachel Turner: Thanks to the team.
Q170 Baroness Henig: Can I move on to the EU strategy for the Horn of Africa and the
appointment of a special representative for the region. What is your view of that? How are
preparations for EUCAP Nestor progressing and when will it be in place?
Nick Kay: Okay, I get to say something, but Nestor will be Nick’s answer. We are very
positive about the EU’s strategic framework for the Horn of Africa and extremely positive
about the appointment of Alex Rondos as the EU special—
The Chairman: I should tell the Committee that we have Mr Rondos at the back of the
room. I did not want to announce it beforehand but you said the right thing, Mr Kay. I did
not want to skew the conversation.
Nick Kay: Let me breathe a sigh of a relief. I will try to spare Alex’s blushes, but I think his
appointment has marked a significant step change, if you like, in the ability of the EU as an
institution to engage on the political processes, which are, on the whole, vital in
underpinning long term success in Somalia. So, yes, we are very positive and particularly Alex
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has brought a focus to trying to concentrate our efforts on the ground in Mogadishu and has
spent an admirable amount of time himself both in Mogadishu and in the region as well. I
think that is all to the good. There is a role for a travelling circus of international meetings
on Somalia, one of which was very successful in London in February and subsequently we
have had a meeting in Istanbul, the second Istanbul conference. Next week there is going to
be one in Rome. These all have an importance and a role but what we need to do is shift the
centre of our gravity toward Mogadishu increasingly and Alex is doing very well on that side.
Nick Pickard: In terms of EUCAP Nestor, our plans are progressing well. It is quite a
complex operation. A number of different countries are providing a number of different
types of support. The plans are largely in place. The EU has sent out an invitation to the
countries concerned and Djibouti, Somalia and the Seychelles have indicated that they will
accept the mission. We are still waiting for formal acceptance from Kenya and Tanzania but
when we get that we will be able to launch the mission––we hope, in the summer or early
autumn.
Q171 Baroness Henig: What are the timescales? How is it being envisaged that this will
develop?
Nick Pickard: The mandate at the moment is two years, although that may be extended
depending on circumstances at the time. As I said, we expect it to launch in the next few
months.
Q172 The Chairman: Clearly, Britain has a major contribution in terms of the
operational HQ of Atalanta, but in terms of the Nestor, are we expecting to have a UK
input into that?
Nick Pickard: We have nominated seven candidates so far for the mission; they will not all
be successful because they have applied for five positions. So we will be providing a
contribution to the mission. It will launch with 28 staff initially and that should grow to a
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maximum of 176 once it has reached full capacity. So it is a complex and significant mission.
It is providing legal and organisational advice for all the five countries, if the Kenyans and
Tanzanians agree; coastguard training in Victoria, Dar es Salaam, Zanzibar and Djibouti;
training and strengthening of Somali coastal police and judiciary in Somaliland and Puntland
specifically; the enhancement of regional co-operation through information-sharing through a
regional training centre in Djibouti; and then co-ordination with other relevant organisations,
agencies and institutions also working in this area across the Horn of Africa. So there are
really quite a number of strands to this mission.
Q173 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: I am just trying to gather my geography together.
Djibouti is surely a very close neighbour of both Ethiopia and Eritrea.
Nick Pickard: It certainly has a border with Eritrea and Ethiopia as well.
Q174 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: But those two countries are not included in your
list?
Nick Pickard: No. Ethiopia does not have a coastal border. It is a landlocked country. It is
obviously playing a significant part in the broader development of Somalia and its armed
forces have been operating in Somalia. But it does not, I do not think, see a direct role for
itself in combating piracy. We certainly cannot provide coastguard training and the like—
sorry, I do not mean to be facetious—but this mission is focused very much on direct
training for piracy capacity-building that Ethiopia is not in a position to do.
Baroness Eccles of Moulton: But Eritrea has—
Nick Pickard: We have not invited Eritrea. I think the circumstances in Eritrea would make
it quite difficult to achieve a partnership between the EU and Eritrea.
Baroness Eccles of Moulton: They are a bit dodgy, yes.
Q175 The Chairman: Perhaps I could move on to our final question but there are a
couple of other things I want to sweep up. In fact, I will go through those first. On the
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Eritrea question, one of the organisations that we particularly come across in our
conversations is IGAD, which I know Eritrea was more or less thrown out of and I suspect
is one of the reasons it is not perhaps included in this either. Is there a relationship with
IGAD and how do you assess that organisation? Is it helping developments in the Horn of
Africa area? I did not want opening statements but I ask Mr Kay just to give us a view of the
broader Horn of Africa political situation and Somalia itself. When we talk about Somalia,
our image is of one of the most lawless parts of the world––hence the problem of piracy––
where military interventions in the past have been disastrous and frankly there has not been
much of a solution. But the impression I get is that the feeling is rather more positive now. I
think it would be useful for us to have a comment on that.
I would also like comments on the co-ordination between the EU and the UNDP rule of law
and security programme and comments on security reform. But without trying to extend it
too much, as we probably need to finish within about three or four minutes, perhaps you
could do that for us.
Lord Radice: In addition you will obviously want to say something about the African Union
effort in Somalia and so on?
Nick Kay: Indeed. Starting with IGAD, IGAD is a very important player in the Somalia
context and has a very active role, particularly on developing stabilisation planning for
following up in the areas newly liberated by AMISOM or Ethiopian forces. I think they are
very active and, as I say, a valuable member of that.
The African Union, above and beyond, is a sort of superior body to IGAD and the African
Union involvement, again through the AMISOM mission, is extremely valuable. We view the
regional ownership of the problem and the regional willingness to invest significant resources
and indeed their lives in terms of the sacrifices made by AMISOM troops as thoroughly
laudable and a thoroughly positive development.
Department for International Development – Oral evidence (QQ109 – 175)
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In general, the snapshot on how we view Somalia at the moment is that there is increasing
optimism around the progress on the political process which is nearing completion. On 20
August a new Somalia political disposition should be born. There is a certain degree of
optimism around the military process as well. AMISOM has now been able to push out of
Mogadishu and take the strategically important town of Afgoye and there is the progress of
the Ethiopians as well. Similarly, there is the hatting of the Kenyan forces under AMISOM
which happened on 2 June. They have officially become a part of AMISOM. Yesterday, the
EU, in a very significant development, approved the funding for the expanded AMISOM
mission up until the end of this year. They will pay the allowances and stipends for the
AMISOM forces until the end of 2012. That is a significant cost––about €100 million of
investment there.
A lot of things are pointing in an encouraging direction, but I think that we, and many other
long time observers of it, will reserve a certain degree of caution about whether the tides
have turned. We all know that tides have an annoying habit of going out and coming in and
going out. So I think it is far too soon to have the hats in the air. But, on the political
process, hard work is happening now on the ground as the collection of elders has been
assembled and is going to appoint a constituent assembly, which will appoint a parliament as
well. The timeline is eight weeks from yesterday to complete this. So there is a lot of work
there.
Again, on the good news and positive developments, you may have noticed that yesterday a
process began between Somaliland and the Transitional Federal Government hosted by the
UK, EU and Norway to begin talks about talks and to reach a settlement about this 21 year-
old dispute. It is the first time for 21 years that they have formally sat down together. It is
very preliminary and very low profile, but it is in the public domain. This was hosted at
Chevening yesterday and it is continuing today. So, again, it is just an encouraging sign that
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perhaps a political moment and an attitude of more constructive engagement has arrived
there. But let us not fool ourselves. There is a lot to be done still. On the security situation,
the Al-Shabaab capability is still there. They still control a significant amount of central
southern Somalia. The operating environment for the things that we want to do––
stabilisation, interventions, quick impact projects, long-term development, and even
humanitarian aid––is extremely dangerous and risky. This is operating at the outer bounds of
ease, let us say. I say that having come from being ambassador in Sudan, before that
ambassador in DRC and before that the head of our provincial reconstruction team in
Lashkar Gah.
Baroness Eccles of Moulton: Which was the worst?
Nick Kay: My goodness, no, it is invidious to draw comparisons. But, let us say, in terms of
setting up and operating within Mogadishu, we are looking more at a model similar to
Helmand and Lashkar Gah than to establishing even an embassy in Juba, which is a relatively
normal and benign thing by comparison.
The Chairman: Okay. Thank you. We look forward to hearing where you will be
transferred next and I am sure we will be having inquiry on that. I think I need to bring it to
an end there. But, Mr Pickard, Mr Kay, Rachel, thank you very much indeed for giving us an
excellent evidence session. Rachel, we wish you every success in your demanding task. But
thank you very much. I hereby end this public session. Unfortunately I will have to move into
private session for about two minutes. If I could ask members of the public to go outside;
they will be very welcome back afterwards. Thank you.
Foreign and Commonwealth Office – Oral evidence (QQ109 – 175)
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Foreign and Commonwealth Office – Oral evidence (QQ109 – 175)
Evidence to be found under Department for International Development
Foreign and Commonwealth Office – Supplementary written
evidence
ADDITIONAL NOTE ON THE USE OF ARMED GUARDS
Government policy change: risk mitigation
The Department for Transport (DfT) conducted a full risk evaluation as part of the decision
to change UK Government policy on the use of armed guards. DfT strongly recommends
that all UK ships follow the advice included in “Best Management Practices” (BMP). This is
industry-developed advice to international shipping, supported by joint international naval
forces and law enforcement organisations, on measures to avoid, deter and delay acts of
Somali piracy, including reporting to the counter-piracy cell, United Kingdom Maritime
Trade Operations (UKMTO), in Dubai.
The evaluation found that while the adoption of Best Management Practice had been very
effective in helping vessels to avoid, delay and deter piracy attacks, it did not offer full
protection. The use of armed guards could provide further protection in exceptional
circumstances, provided that the associated risks were mitigated. Mitigations identified
include issuing guidance; working with industry and subject matter experts to set
international standards which provide the basis for accreditation of private security
companies; authorising firearms; and process review. These are set out in more detail below.
National guidance
In December 2011, DfT published Interim guidance to UK flagged shipping on the use of armed
guards to defend against the threat of piracy in exceptional circumstances. A revised version of
the guidance (v.1.1) was published on 14 June 2012. This revision includes additional
guidance on the Master's authority and command & control (in section 5); and on defending
against a pirate attack, including the rules on the use of force and the associated legal risks
(in section 8).
The guidance sets out Government policy on the use of armed guards onboard UK ships.
This includes elements that should be included in the contract between the shipping
company and the Private Security Company (PSC); the importance of conducting a full risk
assessment before taking a decision to use armed guards; command and control of the
security team, including the Master’s authority; and the storage, handling and movement of
firearms.
Application of the guidance
The 'exceptional circumstances' for which this guidance on Government policy applies are:
when the ship is transiting the high seas throughout the designated High Risk Area(HRA), an area bounded by Suez and the Straits of Hormuz to the north, 10°S
and 78°E; and
Foreign and Commonwealth Office – Supplementary written evidence
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the latest BMP is being followed fully but, on its own, is not deemed by the shipping company and the ship’s master as sufficient to protect against acts of piracy; and
the use of armed guards is assessed in the ship’s security plan to reduce the risk to
the lives and well-being of those onboard the ship.
Additionally, Government policy to support the use of armed guards in such circumstances
only applies to internationally trading passenger ships and cargo ships of 500 gross tonnages
and above.
Armed guards are not permitted by UK policy for use in other HRAs currently designated
by Lloyds (for example, the waters off Nigeria and Benin). The decision to allow armed
guards on UK-flagged vessels in the HRA off the coast of Somalia was made following a full
evaluation of the risks associated with their use and the value they could contribute to
security. The situation off Nigeria and Benin is being monitored.
Legal risks
The guidance is designed to support ship-owners and PSCs conducting counter-piracy
operations off the coast of Somalia by providing clear steps that should be taken prior to
deployment and during a pirate attack. Complying with rules on the use of force as detailed
in the DfT interim guidance may serve to reduce the risk of armed guards acting unlawfully.
However, in the event that criminal charges (e.g. in respect of offences related to unlawful
killing or assault) are brought to court, proving that one acted within the agreed rules on the
use of force would not in itself serve as a defence. It would be for the enforcement agencies
and then the court to decide whether the force used in the particular case was lawful. All
parties involved are advised to obtain independent legal advice. Ultimately it is the PSC and
individual armed guard that own the risk of prosecution. PSCs need to make the investment
to follow proper procedure and train their personnel in order that they can mitigate this
risk.
Weapon security risks
Section 6 of the guidance deals with the storage, handling and movement of firearms. It
states that the embarkation and disembarkation of firearms should take place at the soonest
safe, convenient and lawful opportunity outside the High Risk Area and in accordance with
the legal requirements of the State where this takes place. When embarking or disembarking
firearms, ammunition and other security related equipment at a foreign port, or calling at a
foreign port with such items onboard (but not disembarking them), it is essential that the
laws of that port State are respected and complied with.
Prior to the voyage, the PSC must seek clarification from the port State on their laws and
requirements regarding the possession, embarkation and disembarkation of firearms,
ammunition and other security related equipment; and the embarkation and disembarkation
of security personnel. All laws and requirements of the port state must be respected and
complied with fully.
International standards and guidance
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International quality standards are being developed to provide some additional assurance.
The International Maritime Organization (IMO) has issued interim guidance to PSCs which
was agreed at the Maritime Safety Committee in May, which complements the DfT guidance.
It is based on guidance drafted by a UK-chaired intersessional sub-group of Working Group
3 of the Contact Group on Piracy off the Coast of Somalia. The IMO has requested that the
International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) develop international standards for
private security companies based on their guidance, which will provide the basis for an
international accreditation process. DfT, the Security in Complex Environments Group
(SCEG) and the IMO will be actively engaged in the ISO process, which should produce a
first draft by November 2012. The IMO has also made revisions to its interim guidance for
ship-owners, ship-operators and shipmasters to reflect the new guidance to PSCs issued
following the May Maritime Safety Committee.
Authorisation of firearms
A key part of the Government’s policy review was to determine if the Firearms Act 1968 (as
amended) applies on board UK-flagged ships while on the high seas. The Home Office
decided it was necessary to authorise the possession of prohibited firearms onboard UK
ships using the powers already included in the Firearms Act. Accordingly, any PSC wishing to
deploy armed operatives on board UK-flagged vessels must apply to the Home Office for a
section 5 licence. The Home Office then conducts a number of checks on these companies
and the guards they employ before issuing these authorisations.
The Home Office operates the section 5 authorisation process as follows:
DfT receives a copy of the shipping company’s counter-piracy plan (CPP). This includes a
signed statement from the shipping company confirming that the DfT guidance has been
followed, a copy of the full risk assessment to determine whether the business need to
use these weapons is proven, and whether the number and type of prohibited firearms requested is acceptable and proportionate. This plan must be presented to DfT before
the deployment of armed guards. The DfT advise the Home Office when the CPP has
been received.
Under Home Office instruction, the PSC’s local police force is asked to conduct section
5 checks into the owner of the PSC and, in addition, checks for each of the proposed
armed guards;
On receipt of the results of the checks, a decision is taken [by the Home Office] on whether to grant a section 5 authority to the PSC.
Monitoring and review
DfT has committed to review its interim guidance by December 2012 and is currently
working with the shipping industry and other Government departments on the revision.
HMG does not hold comprehensive and accurate data on the number of armed guards that
have fired at pirates, but there is a dialog with the shipping and security industry through
which the situation is reviewed. We can also confirm that no ship with armed guards on
board has been pirated. We are also monitoring the risk of increased violence: currently
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pirates off the Horn of Africa are being deterred by the presence of armed guards and do
not appear to be responding through increased levels of violence.
There are export controls on the removal from the UK of firearms, ammunition and other
military and paramilitary equipment; and trade controls on the involvement of UK persons in
moving, or arranging the movement, of such items between overseas countries. The Export
Control Organisation (ECO), part of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills
(BIS), is responsible for these controls. In most cases export of, or trade in, such items is
prohibited unless authorised by a licence issued by the ECO. BIS has a compliance team to
monitor the process.
Other countries’ policies on armed guards
Countries that approve the use of private armed guards include: Cyprus, Panama, Hong
Kong, India, Spain, and Norway. France and Italy have military Vessel Protection
Detachments; when these are not available private security companies are permitted.
Although we do not keep complete data, we believe that the number of countries allowing
armed guards on-board is increasing.
July 2012
Christian Le Mière, Research Fellow for Naval Forces and Maritime Security International Institute for
Strategic Studies – Written evidence
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Christian Le Mière, Research Fellow for Naval Forces and Maritime
Security International Institute for Strategic Studies – Written
evidence
1. Piracy continues to be a problem in the Indian Ocean and the Gulf of Aden.
However, the number of attempted attacks and successful hijackings continues to fall
for a variety of reasons. According to the IMB, until 21 June 2012, 63 incidents
involving Somali pirates had occurred and 12 vessels had been hijacked. In the first
half of 2011, the comparable figures were 163 attacks and 21 hijackings.
2. Nonetheless, this remains an unacceptably high number of innocent sailors that must
endure the hardship, stress and occasionally physical torment of prolonged hostage
situations. The IMB estimates 178 sailors are currently held by Somali pirates (on 12
ships); EUNAVFOR estimates that number to be 213 hostages (aboard seven
vessels).
3. The reasons for the decline in attacks are multiple: the deployment of international
naval forces has had an effect on the activities of pirates, although it is debatable how
extensive that effect has been; the growing use of private maritime security
companies has acted as a deterrent to attacks on various vessels; improved judicial
cooperation in piracy trials; and perhaps most importantly shipping companies have
increasingly adopted Best Management Practices.
4. Quantifying the effect of each of these factors is impossible, but the activities of the
international naval forces have been effective in providing protection to vessels in the
Internationally Recommended Transit Corridor, deterring or preventing numerous
attacks and increasing the costs of each individual piracy action group.
5. The extension of Operation Atalanta’s mandate in March 2012, which subsequently
allowed for on-land attacks in May 2012, has the potential to be a ‘game-changer’, in
that disruptive attacks on Somali pirate bases and logistical hubs would greatly
increase the costs and risks to Somali pirates. While the motivations and drivers for
Somali pirates are multiple, a negative cost-benefit analysis would weigh heavily
against the attraction of further attacks. However, the only operation launched thus
far on land in Somalia was so benign as to be largely ineffective, involving the
destruction of a number of small boats, and reflected the political difficulties inherent
in the EU launching attacks on land. As such, it is unclear whether the political will
exists to undertake more assertive military operations on land that could, through
the very asymmetry of capabilities, be construed negatively in international media.
6. Such an aggressive military option might be the quickest way to resolve the piracy
issue, but it may not be necessary as the current trend of diminishing attacks is likely
to continue nonetheless. The employment of private maritime security companies
has been another factor in undermining the attraction of particular targets. It is a
Christian Le Mière, Research Fellow for Naval Forces and Maritime Security International Institute for
Strategic Studies – Written evidence
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much-cited statistic that no vessel with private maritime security personnel has yet
been pirated. This may demonstrate correlation, but it is impossible to prove
causation. There is no fundamental reason why pirates, sufficiently armed and trained
and with innovative tactics, would not be able to attack a guarded ship, overwhelm
the defences and still board it, and there is an argument, as yet unproven, that armed
guards will only encourage more aggressive tactics from the pirates. However, there
are various anecdotes of armed guards successfully repelling or deterring pirates
from attacking vessels, and hence it should be assumed that until now their effect has
been to lessen the incidence of piracy on certain vessels/shipping lines.
7. The ability to prosecute pirates through agreements with countries such as the
Seychelles, Kenya, the Maldives, Tanzania and a host of other regional and extra-
regional countries, ensures that suspected pirates are removed from the system
rather than returned to Somalia. The difficulties with this process have been either a
lack of capacity in regional countries to prosecute and imprison pirates, a factor
largely alleviated by international support, or the impossibility of proving the intent to
pirate from often circumstantial evidence. The latter in particular has stymied
attempts to prosecute pirates, but the renewed effort to secure cooperation from
regional countries means several hundred pirates have been convicted worldwide
thus far.
8. Arguably the most important factor in deterring piracy, however, is the adoption of
Best Management Practices by vessels and shipping companies transiting the Indian
Ocean and Gulf of Aden. Factors such as high freeboards, constant higher speeds,
basic protection measures, evasive manoeuvres, constant look-outs and the
employment of a citadel system have all been proven to assist in avoiding, deterring
or disrupting pirate attacks. The publication of Best Management Practices 4.0 in
August 2011 reflected the continued attempts to encourage BMPs on board
transiting vessels, which appear to have had some effect by late 2011. Some of the
reduction in successful piracy attacks may well be attributable to this fact.
9. The new piracy ransoms international task force, convened by the UK, has the
potential to scope the moral and policy-related problems with allowing ransoms to
be paid. Piracy funding is one of the best ways to target the operations of pirates, as
it does not necessarily involve military activity, strikes at the heart of the motivations
for and ability to commit piracy and has the ancillary benefit of retaining or recouping
money transferred through ransoms.
10. A lack of intelligence on pirates, piracy logistics and pirate action groups has been
partially alleviated by EUNVAFOR’s presence and intelligence gathering/sharing.
However, a shortage of assets, for example helicopters for aerial surveillance, has
hampered some imagery intelligence gathering efforts, while human intelligence has
been poor owing to a lack of an on-land presence. With the development of
Christian Le Mière, Research Fellow for Naval Forces and Maritime Security International Institute for
Strategic Studies – Written evidence
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Puntland’s counter-piracy force and greater interaction with an increasingly
emboldened Transitional Federal Government in Somalia, intelligence gaps can slowly
be closed.
11. Ultimately, it has become a cliché, but no less true for it, to state that capacity
building and development in Somalia hold the key to long-term counter-piracy
efforts. While more assertive military activity may prove a short-term fix, it will not
undermine the more fundamental problems such as poor employment opportunities
in coastal communities, the attraction of piracy as a trade, increasingly profound
criminal-cultural factors in pirate areas and the easy availability of small arms. A
cross-agency, integrated approach is therefore the best option, using military, judicial,
political and developmental tools to incrementally deter and prevent pirates from
attacks and slowly offer alternatives to undermine the attraction of the industry in its
entirety.
June 2012
Lloyd’s Market Association – Written evidence
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Lloyd’s Market Association – Written evidence
It is the view of LMA that the contribution of EUNAVFOR has been very significant in
checking piracy in the Indian Ocean. The cooperation with the shipping industry has been
most welcome and has helped both industry and navies understand the limiters which apply
to each. There is little doubt that the world has looked to EUNAVFOR to provide a lead
and it did so with the IRTC and promulgation of the UKMTO reporting area. The recent
intervention onshore was very well received.
For insurers, the benefit has been clear risk mitigation and undoubtedly the situation would
have been far worse without the naval operation ably co-ordinated at Northwood.
The source of the problem remains on land but a combination of continued naval presence,
better observation of BMP, better self protection measures and on-board security teams
have contributed to a reduction in the maritime threat and negated the abilities of pirates to
take vessels at will.
It would be extremely regrettable if the naval presence was to be cut too soon as although
there has been progress, it is not irreversible. This is particularly true whilst many of the flag
states have not made their positions clear firstly in respect of their duty to prosecute pirates under UNCLOS and secondly on the carriage of arms. Nor can the decision of UAE to
withdraw funding from the Puntland Maritime Police Force be portrayed as other than a
setback when the Djibouti Code of Conduct remains mostly aspirational.
Insurers were pleased that the UK offered some guidance to shipping companies about
armed guards but were disquieted by the loopholes that were left around sub-500gt vessels
as that excluded most of the super yachts which often have arms and /or armed guards on
board – on enquiry it seems they can apply for dispensation but have to do so individually.
The proviso that arms can only be carried in the (UKMTO) high risk area has inherent legal
complications around weapon sourcing and access. The paper stipulated that armed guards
can only be employed “when the ship is transiting the high seas throughout the High Risk
Area (HRA) (an area bounded by Suez and the Straights of Hormuz to the North, 10°S and
78°E)”. This presents practical problems for those embarking and disembarking teams – both
have to be done within the HRA but not all countries (and their ports) allow this and it is
impractical in mid-ocean.
It is believed that UK security teams are effectively prevented from using floating arsenals
due to the way the Open General Trade Control Licences are dealt with under the Export
Control Order 2008. As no floating armouries have been approved by BIS to date, to use
one would put an operator in breach of the license. One consequence may be that security
teams from those countries that do allow such access could displace the more professional
and better qualified UK teams, possibly driving standards down; SCEG have been made
aware of this.
Moreover, insurers feel that more needs to be done in the accreditation area as the only
current yard-stick by which to measure the efficiency and competence of a security provider
is by word of mouth.
Lloyd’s Market Association – Written evidence
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Neil Roberts
Lloyd’s Market Association
June 2012
Ministry of Defence – Oral evidence (QQ64 – QQ108)
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Ministry of Defence – Oral evidence (QQ64 – QQ108)
Evidence Session No. 3. Heard in Public. Questions 64 - 108
THURSDAY 14 JUNE 2012
10.50 am
Members present
Lord Teverson (Chairman)
Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury
Lord Boswell of Aynho
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Henig
Lord Inge
Lord Jay of Ewelme
Lord Jopling
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
Lord Radice
Lord Trimble
Lord Williams of Elvel
Baroness Young of Hornsey
________________
Examination of Witnesses
Nick Harvey MP, Minister of State for the Armed Forces; and Captain Reindorp RN,
Ministry of Defence.
Q64 The Chairman: Minister, Captain, welcome to this first day of our inquiry into
Somali piracy and, more broadly, the EU’s intervention in the Horn of Africa area. This is the
first day we have had of evidence and we are hoping to produce a follow-up report to our
previous one, because we have taken—as I know the House of Commons has—quite an
interest in this issue. I just remind you this is a public session. It is being webcast. We are
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taking a transcription. We will give you an opportunity to look at that to correct any errors
that we have made in that transcription before it becomes an official record. Perhaps what
both of you could do is to introduce yourselves very briefly. Minister, I think you want to
make a short opening statement and then we will open it out to questions. When we get to
questions then which of you wants to answer the questions is entirely up to yourselves.
Minister, would you like to start?
Nick Harvey: Thank you very much, Chairman. Yes, Nick Harvey, Minister for the Armed
Forces and responsible for operations, including counter-piracy operations off the Horn of
Africa.
Captain Reindorp: Good morning. Captain David Reindorp, I lead the MoD’s counter-
piracy team.
Q65 The Chairman: Thank you very much. Minister, I think you wanted to make a short
introduction.
Nick Harvey: Thank you. Yes. Firstly, many thanks for the opportunity to come and help
inform your inquiry. The point I wanted to make in introduction was simply this. I know that
the Committee had previously asked for a representative of the EU to attend this session.
Quite clearly I am not a representative of the EU, so I am not in a position to give views or
opinions on their behalf. Additionally, I should note that my ministerial portfolio includes the
UK military response to piracy off the coast of Somalia but does not include European
defence matters, such as CSDP, as a core part of my work. But if the Committee recognises
and is content with this, what I can do is give a UK perspective on those of your questions
that focus on counter-piracy, and as I can I will point you in the direction of anyone else I
think might be able to answer any specific point that you want to probe.
Q66 Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: Just for information, what Minister does cover
European defence?
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Nick Harvey: Gerald Howarth does. He is the Minister for International Security Strategy.
The Chairman: Yes. In fact, Mr Howarth has appeared before us in terms of our previous
inquiry on safety. We have had quite a change on the Committee since that point.
Q67 Lord Inge: First of all, Minister, could you please say something about what you
think has been the most important achievements of Operation Atalanta and what progress
has been made since 2010? Do you think the piracy problem has increased or decreased,
and could you say something about what capability gaps you believe it has at the moment?
Nick Harvey: Thank you, yes. The first thing I would point to is that the work being
conducted through the EU Operation Atalanta has been an exemplar for maritime security
co-operation with the other two missions in the area—the NATO mission and the US-led
international force—as well as independent work by China, India, Japan, Russia and Taiwan. I
think the international co-operation has been a success story; the sharing of information has
worked extremely well. I would also say that the connections between the counter-piracy
work and a more comprehensive approach by the international community are working well
also. In terms of the levels of piracy, we are succeeding in reducing piracy to a minimal level,
but while accepting that military activity is not going to eliminate piracy—certainly not on its
own—we are succeeding in helping bringing about a reduction. It is often said that the
solutions to the underlying problems are on the land and not at sea, so I think one just has
to be realistic in recognising the scope of what we can hope to achieve. I expect at some
point in the meeting we will discuss the disruption of pirate logistic events, so we will come
on to that I do not doubt.
In terms of levels and progress in the last couple of years, it would probably be helpful if I
was to say this: this time last year there were 23 pirated vessels and 501 hostages compared
with now eight pirated vessels and 215 hostages. Incidents of piracy vary in their severity but
there has been a steady decline in the success of pirate attacks, which suggests that our
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deter-and-disrupt interventions, combined with a much greater adherence on the part of the
shipping industry with best management practice, is beginning to have an effect. The number
of pirates and suspected pirates currently in the international justice system totals over
1,000 and the EU NAVFOR has transferred 128 since the mission started, including most
recently last month 11 to the Seychelles—I believe you have been talking to the Seychelles
earlier.
I think we can be pleased with progress, with the levels of international co-operation. The
problem is not solved by any means, but the combined efforts of the international
community and the shipping industry itself are definitely beginning to have some effect.
Q68 Lord Inge: Are there any capabilities particularly that you feel you lack?
Nick Harvey: It would be very much a matter for the EU Commander who is responsible
for the mission to point to any capability gaps that he feels he is experiencing. So far as the
UK Government is concerned, we are content that the mission appears to have the
capabilities it needs. But if the EU were to come to us and flag up concerns that there were
problems and capability gaps, we would certainly anticipate working with EU colleagues to
try and fill such gaps.
Q69 Lord Inge: In other words, no bid has been made.
Nick Harvey: Nobody is knocking at our door, are they?
Captain Reindorp: Not at the moment, no.
Q70 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: We heard earlier today from the
Seychelles Foreign Minister, who highlighted the problem of what happens to captured
pirates. Is the main purpose to deter attacks, or is it to apprehend? How, practically, are
suspected pirates handled when captured? Those are the first few questions.
Nick Harvey: Operation Atalanta’s mandate says that the objective is: “the deterrence,
prevention and repression of acts of piracy and armed robbery off the Somali coast; the
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protection of vessels of the World Food Programme delivering food aid to displaced
persons in Somalia; the protection of African Union Mission on Somalia shipping; and the
protection of vulnerable shipping off the Somali coast on a case by case basis”. The main
purpose of the operation in the terms that you are asking is to deter, prevent and repress. I
would say it is a by-product of the activity that we get ourselves involved in the
apprehension of pirates. That is why the EU has sought to use a comprehensive approach
involving not just military deterrents but also legal, judicial, penal, training and development
activities. It is this more comprehensive approach that has enabled the EU to form legal
agreements with various countries in the region in connection with prosecution of pirates.
In terms of how they are handled when captured, in a sense if you get the chance to address
that question to the EU Operation Commander that will be the appropriate place to direct
it, because there are agreements between the EU and the participating states. I do not know
whether Captain Reindorp wants to add anything.
Captain Reindorp: I can if you wish. Can I just go back to your first question though? I will
try and explain where the terminology “repress, deter, disrupt and protect” comes from.
“Repress” is what UNCLOS—the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea—
requires all states to do when it comes to piracy. It does not particularly define what
“repress” is, but it is just taken to mean do something about it or stop it. Being military we
then convert it into our own language, and that is where the “deter and disrupt” part comes
from. It is the effect we believe that we are best placed to achieve. “Deter” is obvious.
“Disrupt” means stop them in the act. The MoD has chosen to do that because that is
where we think our specialities lie at the high end—the sort of fighting part—of counter-
piracy. As the Minister says, the “apprehend” part is almost a by-product of that.
Q71 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: But “deter” must involve “apprehend”,
must it not?
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Captain Reindorp: “Deter” involves the whole start-to-end solution. It is not just what is
done at sea. Arguably, what is done on land—the prosecutions and locking people away—is
as much a deterrent effect as it is for us to oversee.
On the second part about practice, as a practitioner my answer to your question would be:
“Very, very carefully is how we go about detaining these people”. We are fully trained; we
have become better at it. They are handled very carefully because of course this is a
constabulary operation and they therefore have to be handled in accordance with all the
rules and regulations for handling people that we detain.
Q72 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: Do the vessels have to break off their
duties and make to port to deliver—
Captain Reindorp: If you pick up some people whom you believe to be suspected pirates,
you can continue with your operations up until the point that you then decide, or it is
decided for you, that you need to take them somewhere for prosecution. It is at the point at
which there is a clear legal path of prosecution—that is, another country offers to take
them—that you then have to move them ashore. To the best of my knowledge, that is
generally done by taking the ship into port, yes.
Nick Harvey: You cannot pass them to intermediaries?
Captain Reindorp: I do not think we can, no.
Q73 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: You are not going to keep them on
there forever, so inevitably you are going to have to land.
Captain Reindorp: You have to land them in some way. You can either let them go or you
can pass them on for prosecution.
Q74 Lord Lamont of Lerwick: Could you just fill in the basic arithmetic for us? How
many ships do we have dedicated to the Atalanta mission, how many other UK vessels under
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other commands and how do you decide this? I think you have answered the last part about
demands for an increase. “If asked”, I think, was your reply?
Nick Harvey: Yes. The UK does not currently have any vessels dedicated to Operation
Atalanta. Over the duration of the operation we have typically been contributing one vessel
for three months in a two-year period. Our principal contribution to the operation is that
we continue to provide the Operation Commander, the operational headquarters and
approximately 50% of the staff for the headquarters, and we will continue doing that for the
remainder of the mandate. The last UK warship to contribute to Operation Atalanta was
HMS Richmond in the first half of 2011.
As you say, Lord Lamont, we also participate in the other international effort to combat
piracy there. We have provided frigates to the US-led combined maritime force. Most
recently RFA Fort Victoria and the Navy have also contributed to the NATO Ocean Shield
counter-piracy mission. Again, the last contribution there was also RFA Fort Victoria,
between September last year and January of this year. NATO is working alongside other
task forces to protect maritime traffic.
In terms of how we decide it, at any given point in time resources are allocated on the basis
of an assessment of the availability of our assets, the requirements of each mission and the
opportunity cost of assigning assets to these missions. Sometimes more than one of the
three will ask us for something at the same time and that becomes extremely difficult. I do
not know if Captain Reindorp wants to add anything to that.
Captain Reindorp: Just a little detail, if I may. Our last contribution to NATO, I would just
like to explain. It was more than just a hull. This was a large hull with a dedicated command
team on board with interpreters, with an intelligence fusion function, several helicopters, a
party of marines and one or two other things that I am afraid I cannot go into in this forum.
It was specifically put together to counter a specific threat, which is the known peak period
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of pirate activity during the inter-monsoon periods. It went out into theatre and it did its job
really quite well. There were several well-publicised take-downs. We had one or two
reporters, and this all made the press, and it culminated with the seizure of 14 suspected
pirates, which were eventually landed to the Seychelles for prosecution.
Q75 Lord Lamont of Lerwick: We heard in the previous session that attack helicopters
had proved particularly effective against pirates. In fact, I think it was almost suggested it was
a bit of a game changer. Do you agree with that assessment and would we ever be providing
attack helicopters?
Captain Reindorp: I am not sure I do agree with that assessment. I have to say that using an
attack helicopter to target pirates would, I think, break our rules of engagement, which are
based solely on the law of self-defence. We will only engage when we feel ourselves to be
threatened. That engagement has to be proportional, and I am not sure an attack helicopter
would be considered proportionate.
Q76 Lord Lamont of Lerwick: I think they were using them for targets on land rather
than people.
Captain Reindorp: To the best of my knowledge, the only land attack that there has been is
the one that the EU conducted recently against what they call Camp Grisby up on the north
coast of Somalia. A little detail may explain what that attack looked like. It took 17 seconds,
the helicopter did not go over land and it fired about 70 rounds, and I understand they were
fired from a sniper rifle and one machine gun. That is not an attack helicopter, as I
understand it.
Q77 The Chairman: That is some interesting detail on that and an interesting
perception. Despite what it was made up of—and it might look fairly minor in comparison to
a night out in certain London suburbs—did it have a psychological effect?
Captain Reindorp: Are we talking about the EU attack on Camp Grisby here?
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The Chairman: Yes.
Captain Reindorp: I think it had a significant effect. The messaging was absolutely crucial,
not just to the pirates but also to the international community. It was the first time that
counter-piracy activity had been conducted ashore. There is an interesting aside to that.
Piracy can legally only happen at sea, so this is quite a unique piece of legal instrument that
allows counter-piracy, something that can only happen at sea, to be conducted on land. We
know that it rather upset the pirate who owned the camp, and it is a bit more important
than that because this was the first real occasion that the military forces were able to attack
what we call—sorry, another piece of military speak—their strategic centre of gravity, which
is the strategic thing that gives them their strength.
The Chairman: I am rather treading on the toes of Lord Jay’s question, a little bit further
down the agenda.
Lord Jay of Ewelme: Do carry on.
The Chairman: No, I will stop at that point and we will take the matter on then. I
apologise to Lord Jay.
Q78 Lord Radice: As you imply, the Atalanta operation works by rotation of vessels. Are
you satisfied that this rotation is going well and working smoothly? It would just be
interesting for us to know which other countries are providing vessels.
Nick Harvey: In principle, I would say to you that is a question you would need to address
to the EU headquarters because we, as the UK Government, do not compile information
about the precise contribution other countries are making or obviously the force flow
issues. Having made that rather unhelpful start, I would say I do not think we are aware
particularly of any problems but Captain Reindorp—
Captain Reindorp: We are not, sir. Indeed I spoke to Admiral Potts—the EU Operational
Commander—yesterday during his call on CDS, and he says he would be quite happy to
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appear before you if you were to invite him again. He discussed the issue of force rotation
and from his perspective there were no problems. There are times of dearth and there are
times of plenty, as there always are. He made the point that his three major contributors—
although I cannot quote you any figures, I am afraid—were the French, the Spanish and the
Germans.
Q79 Lord Radice: So we are not a major contributor.
Captain Reindorp: Not in terms of hulls. In terms of leadership—
Q80 Lord Radice: “Hulls” means boats?
Captain Reindorp: Yes.
The Chairman: We are aware that the mission commander is very keen. We have not
managed within the timeframe to sort that out, although we have previously visited
Northwood as a Committee. Was there anything else, Lord Radice?
Q81 Lord Radice: Why are we not contributing more? We are a great maritime nation,
with a great Navy. Is it that we have run out of ships?
Nick Harvey: If you look back to the national security strategy from two years ago, the
point I would make is that counter-piracy is not flagged up as a strategic threat. If you
compare the threat to the UK from piracy with the variety of other threats that we face, and
certainly if you look at figures on the number of UK ships pirated, that national security
strategy assessment seems to me to be entirely valid and spot on. Counter-piracy is neither
a standing nor a contingent task for us and can only be done from spare capacity. We are
always looking for the opportunity to deploy assets to counter-piracy missions, but you
were touching on it. Obviously, the Navy is stretched with a number of standing tasks that it
is committed to and, therefore, there will be occasions where we have the capacity to
contribute into these missions and there will be other times when we have not.
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Q82 The Chairman: Can I just ask about that point, Minister? One of the things we
sometimes forget is that piracy does happen elsewhere in the world other than Somalia. Just
in that broader context, is the UK involved in any other sort of positive anti-piracy activity?
Does clamping down on Somalia give a message elsewhere in the world, or does it not make
any difference? Presumably it is a local enterprise, is it not?
Nick Harvey: It is probably a regional enterprise. I have visited and talked to Governments
in West Africa about increasing problems off the coast there, and it is certainly the case that
we are rendering advice and any support we can. But we are not involved in an actual
practical mission there. I would say that some of our other patrol works—for example,
counter-narcotics work in the central Atlantic area—touch on the activities of a fairly similar
kind. Captain Reindorp, do you have anything to add to that?
Captain Reindorp: Not at all, sir. But, in effect, piracy is just one element of maritime
criminality and the Royal Navy will try and disrupt maritime criminality wherever it finds it.
Q83 Lord Williams of Elvel: Minister, you did say that the United Kingdom provided
the operational headquarters, and you did say that we were prepared to do so for the
remainder of this mandate.
Nick Harvey: Yes.
Q84 Lord Williams of Elvel: Is the implication there that, if and when the mandate is
renewed, we would be prepared to see the operational headquarters go elsewhere, or do
we consider that there is substantial value to the UK of this particular contribution to the
EU CSDP?
Nick Harvey: We have indeed committed to provide the headquarters for the rest of this
mandate, which goes through to December 2014, and we will continue to provide the
headquarters and the operational commander for that period in the build-up to any
discussion about the extending of the mandate. I think we would take a view at that time on
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whether we would continue contributing to the operation, but in principle I am certainly not
aware of any reason why we would not be willing to keep doing this.
Q85 Lord Williams of Elvel: Do you know any other member states who are bidding
for it?
Nick Harvey: Not bidding for it, but the—
Captain Reindorp: I am not aware that there has ever been any formal bid for anybody else
to take it on. There will always be the odd bit of politics floating around, particularly when
there are other issues that can use this to leverage off.
If I could just add to the Minister’s line, the benefit is not just one way. Again, talking to
Admiral Duncan yesterday, he clearly made the point that the EU, and the great majority of
the people who work for him, who do not come from the UK, value the UK’s leadership in
this area. Northwood is a very good command centre. It is co-located with NATO. There
are all sorts of intelligence assets that can be plugged into it as well. It would be difficult but
not impossible to see where they could go to get a better one.
Q86 Lord Williams of Elvel: Does Northwood have sufficient access to intelligence on
a day-to-day basis?
Captain Reindorp: Yes, sir.
Nick Harvey: It is a very substantial UK contribution to the EU CSDP and we are pleased to
get the opportunity to make that contribution, which plays to some of our strengths. I think
that it gives us the opportunity to share some of our experiences with other member states.
It is demonstrating our commitment not only to the EU CSDP but obviously to protecting
shipping in that part of the world, and I think it enhances our reputation. You have to view
the activity as part of a cascading strategy. The military effort is one aspect to it, but—as I
described a few moments ago to Baroness Bonham-Carter—you have to see this as a
comprehensive policy, including the EU’s work to try and build capacity in that region, so
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that ultimately regional countries there are able to take control of these things for
themselves. We are making a really worthwhile contribution and I think we are recognised
as doing so. Given that our availability of hulls is a little stretched at times, the ability to
provide the HQ is a really good opportunity and one that we are pleased to be fulfilling.
The Chairman: Certainly, when we visited Northwood two years ago, it was quite
impressive at the time, given the mix not just of different military nationalities but of civilian
shipping nations as well.
Q87 Lord Inge: You just mentioned 2010 when we first looked at this. We identified
three capability problems: maritime patrol aircraft, tankers and medical facilities. Is that still a
problem or has that now been solved?
Nick Harvey: That is a question that, if you are going to get the EU Operational
Commander in, you would do well to address to him. Obviously from our point of view, as
the UK Government, we would want to be sure that the operation is being resourced
properly, with adequate finance and the right asset commitment that is necessary to fulfil the
objectives. As Captain Reindorp said, we are not aware of any particular problem nor been
petitioned for help in any particular aspect but perhaps he will give you a fuller answer if you
get him in.
Q88 Lord Inge: Presumably you must know whether you are concerned about it, and
you are saying you are not concerned about this?
Captain Reindorp: To the best of my knowledge there have only been one or two periods
where Atalanta is really struggling for any of the key assets that it needs.
Q89 Lord Inge: And that is not the case at the moment.
Captain Reindorp: No, it is not the case at the moment. In fact, in some areas I have heard
Admiral Duncan say he has more than he needs at the moment. He continually gets new
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offers. For instance, the Ukraine are about to offer him and provide him a maritime patrol
aircraft that Luxembourg now charter to the Seychelles.
Q90 Lord Inge: In other words, the capability provided has been enhanced?
Captain Reindorp: In some ways, yes. I think it is cyclical, sir. It will go up and down at
times, but generally speaking I think he will be—
Q91 Lord Inge: The other problem cited was vessels for delivering the World Food
Programme.
Nick Harvey: A lack of capacity?
Lord Inge: A lack of—
Nick Harvey: That would essentially be between the World Food Programme and—
Lord Inge: I am not saying purely—
Nick Harvey: No. I am not aware of a problem in that sense. I do not know—
Captain Reindorp: There was a time when the ships that the World Food Programme was
chartering were—forgive me—what we call colloquially “bottom feeders”. They are very
low in the water, they are very slow and they are perfect pirate targets.
Lord Inge: I have learnt a new expression today.
Captain Reindorp: Perfect pirate targets, and therefore Atalanta had to spend an awful lot
of time and effort protecting them because that is the key part of their mandate. I
understand they have now chartered some much newer ships. I also understand that the
Admiral has adopted slightly different tactics with them, whereby he builds—again, forgive
me, another piece of military terminology—an autonomous vessel protection detachment, a
bunch of Marines who are sufficiently capable to go on to a ship and protect it without the
need for a close escort.
Q92 The Chairman: Let me just explain because I think this is important. The two things
that came out from this before were, for one, the tendering position of the United Nations
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was that you landed up getting the worst ships and so they had to be protected. That was
one problem; the second problem was the one of not having detachments. The problem
about that was that they would not put in the contracts the mandatory point that the flag
state had to agree for there to be a military attachment on board, rather than having to put
a very expensive hull to go alongside it over the whole delivery period. The obvious thing is
you put the detachment on and you do not have to do the ship. But you had to get the
positive “yes” of the flag state, as I understand it. So that was the issue, and we put a fair bit
of pressure, obviously through the FCO rather than the MoD, in terms of trying to get these
contracts challenged. Sorry, I know we are entering into a document, and that is not what
today is about. But that helps you to understand the concerns we have had, that was it.
Nick Harvey: To the best of my knowledge, those concerns have been addressed.
The Chairman: Good.
Q93 Baroness Henig: We have heard already obviously that there are a number of
different units and operations active in this area, and I was interested in the response to the
first question, I think it was, where you described co-operation and communication across
all these different disparate units. You describe it as a success story. In fact, you said that the
sharing of information and intelligence has worked extremely well, so I suppose I want to
probe this a little bit. If we look at some of the countries involved here—take for example
China and India, who inevitably have very different national interests in this region than, say,
the EU mission—can I just probe you a little here on that? You made it sound very
effortless. In my experience these sorts of situations are rarely as smooth as perhaps you
were describing.
Nick Harvey: Yes, it certainly is not effortless. There are the three international efforts:
Atalanta, NATO’s operation Ocean Shield and the US-led international force. The NATO
Ocean Shield also has its headquarters at Northwood, so there is a very strong link between
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those two operations with liaison officers embedded there to make sure there are good
understandings and shared working practices. In terms of actual information sharing, the
Mercury communications system, which is run by the EU, is shared with other non-EU
countries so there is a degree of sharing information and, therefore, improving
communications. There is also a Shared Awareness and Deconfliction Environment meeting
on a regular basis in Bahrain, where NATO, the EU, the international force and some of
those non-aligned countries that you are referring to, and indeed industry and other
interested parties, come together to make sure that they are sharing information, promoting
best practice and so on. Do you want to add anything?
Captain Reindorp: If I may. The Minister mentioned at the beginning that in many ways
Atalanta can be seen as an exemplar of maritime security co-operation and this is exactly
why. It is not solely the EU’s unit that have delivered this but they have been instrumental in
bringing it together. The SHADE—the Shared Awareness and Deconfliction Environment—
is a meeting that happens on a regular basis, I think three or four times a year, co-chaired
between two of the coalitions and also the non-aligned nations. It has previously been
chaired by the Chinese. It meets in Bahrain and it brings in the whole comprehensive nature
that the Minister has spoken about: industry is there; the FCO is there; we are there; all the
coalition members are there. They sit down and they thrash these issues out, which in true
seafarer fashion are dealt with very practically at sea and deconflicted on the ground
between ships and sub-units and sub-unit commanders.
You mentioned China and India. That is a very interesting one. That appears to work
naturally, perhaps because the Indians see their sphere of influence as east of 65 degrees east
towards their coast and the Chinese come more to the west. Whether that is deliberate or
not, I do not know, but it certainly seems to work.
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The Chairman: I wonder whether Lord Jopling might like to ask a supplementary about an
issue that particularly exercises him in this Committee in this area.
Q94 Lord Jopling: Yes, I have been prompted by the Chairman just in time. This
Committee has been excited over many years about the abysmal lack of co-operation
between NATO and the EU. We will not go into the reasons, which are based on the
Cyprus/Turkey/Greece problem, but would you like to just tell us to what extent you feel
that that tension between the two is causing problems in this ocean at the moment? We
have been told by some witnesses in other fields that ways are being found of getting over
the tripwire, which Turkey so often puts up to block co-operation between EU and NATO.
It is a very serious problem. It has been discussed at both EU and NATO summits on many
occasions, as you know. Could you tell us to what extent this is a problem in this part of the
world?
Nick Harvey: Very broadly, I do not think it is a problem in this context. I recognise entirely
what you are saying, and Turkey/Cyprus/Greece issues do cause problems in other contexts
and cause a wider friction. In this context I think the working relationship is extremely good,
and I think what the EU particularly brings to the international effort here is that because it
is a soft power—it is perceived in that way by nations in this region and perhaps more
widely in that way—it has been able to unlock doors in some of the relevant countries, to
help bring about this comprehensive approach going and looking at judicial issues, in a way I
think NATO would have struggled to because it is perceived in a very different way.
Therefore, the combination of the two has been pretty effective. The wider problems that
you correctly pinpoint do not seem to me to have caused problems in this operation.
Captain Reindorp: I am not aware of any problems.
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The Chairman: The first time we did this it did come up as a practical issue that was got
round in a practical sense. But if it has gone away that is great news and we will leave it at
that. Lord Jay, I think you wanted to continue the issue.
Q95 Lord Jay of Ewelme: To come back to the question of the onshore attack that we
discussed earlier on, when we were planning this session we thought this was such an
important issue that I needed to share this question with Lord Jopling but Captain Reindorp
has rather given the impression that it was more like leaning out of the window with a
popgun, so it is really a bit overdone I think here. Could you say a little bit about whether it
was always intended to be like that, and how the decisions were made to launch the
operation and what the rules of engagement were? Is it a one-off, or are we likely to see
more attacks of this sort? If so, are they likely to be on the same sort of scale, or might they
be slightly sort of more adventurous than the one you have described?
Captain Reindorp: If I have given the impression it was a bit of leaning out of the window
with a popgun then that is incorrect. This was a properly planned military operation, but the
engagement took 17 seconds and they used circa 70 rounds from very light calibre weapons.
It was entirely in accordance with our understanding of international law regarding this,
which I have already mentioned is self-defence only. I have not seen the EU rules of
engagement for some while but the last time I did they complied with the UK understanding
of this, and in fact if they had not the UK officers on the staff would have told us. They are
under a remit to tell us and they did not.
The effect was out of all proportion to the 17 seconds and 70 rounds piece. Probably the
most significant effect was this was the first time we have been able to attack the strategic
centre of gravity piece, their ability to fund and provide investment money to supply boats to
go to sea, to pirate vessels and to bring them back for profit. So what you now have is a
pirate who has lost a certain number of boats and a certain number of engine houses, which
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Mr Big gave him the money for. Not only has he lost them but he has not brought anything
back to recoup the costs. If I were him, I would be running rather scared at the moment
because they are not terribly nice people. It sent a complete message to the pirates. We
know that that has had some effect on the people ashore who have tacitly supported them
up until now. It generated almost universal international approval. The UN special
representatives supported it, the UN in general and various other nations. The region, in
particular, not only supported it but they asked for it.
Will there be future missions? It is a difficult question to answer because we have always
believed that, having done this once, pirates would learn their lesson and they would move
their equipment dumps further inshore, and at the moment most people are not terribly
keen to go further inshore in Somalia. Having said that, when they want to put their pirate
action groups to sea they will have to build a camp somewhere on the shoreline in order to
get the boats to sea, get the engines on the boats and get their four by fours down there to
bring the fuel. So it may well be possible again, but it will depend on the intelligence and the
circumstances. Certainly, the EU plan on doing this again if the opportunity arises.
Q96 Lord Jay of Ewelme: Was the decision to intervene in this case taken just to have
an effect on others, or was it taken because there was perceived to be a particular problem
with a particular pirate enclave onshore?
Captain Reindorp: I think both, to encourage the others and because the opportunity
existed.
Q97 Lord Inge: Quite clearly you have very good intelligence on this. Is that intelligence
still as good as it used to be? In other words, are you still getting jolly good intelligence
where they have these key places? If you want to go and attack another one, how quickly do
you need the authority to go ahead?
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Captain Reindorp: The answer to the intelligence question is: yes, we do. The authority
will depend on how far down the European Union command chain that authority is
delegated to. My understanding is it is delegated to the force commander and he can make a
decision relatively quickly.
Q98 Lord Jopling: Thinking of the lessons that are being learned every day in Pakistan
and Afghanistan and the use of drones, if they are thinking of more land attacks it would be
logical to use drones for that purpose. We were told there are three drones based in
Seychelles. I asked the Minister outside afterwards whether they were entirely devoted to
anti-pirate operations, because I always understood that some of the Seychelles-based
drones were used for Afghanistan, but I was told that was not the case. How many drones
are there available in this whole area besides those in the Seychelles, and are any of them
capable of launching attacks on the ground in the same way that we have seen recently in
Pakistan?
Captain Reindorp: Could I just make clear at the beginning, sir, if you do not mind, that the
attacks that we are authorised to conduct ashore in Somalia are not against people. We have
no authority to directly target people. It is only logistics and equipment.
Lord Jopling: No, I understand that.
Captain Reindorp: In fact one of the things that have to be done before the attack is
authorised is to make sure that that area is sanitised, it is clear of people, so that the risk of
collateral damage—killing a civilian, an innocent person—is absolutely minimised.
Lord Jopling: We had that evidence from the previous witnesses an hour ago.
Captain Reindorp: Yes. As a personal view, I cannot see that ever changing. Piracy is a
constabulary mission or a policing mission; it is not a war-fighting mission like in Afghanistan.
To turn to the trickier element of your question, I cannot confirm what drones are in the
Seychelles, mainly because I do not know and I do not know whether any of them are used
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in Afghanistan. My area of interest at the MoD is purely Somalia and piracy. I do understand
that drones have been used for intelligence gathering and reconnaissance before, but I do
not know whose drones and I do not know where they came from.
Q99 Lord Jopling: Do you know if any of them are capable of launching missiles?
Captain Reindorp: I do not, sir, no.
Q100 The Chairman: Perhaps we could then move on to one of the complications.
When we last looked at Atalanta it was the only EU engagement in the area directly. We
now have a number of other missions and we have the opening of the EU operations centre
for the first time—something that I think our own Government has been slightly iffy about in
the past. Do you have a perspective on how that is working, how they tie up with each
other and where Northwood fits into that? Are we happy that that extra ability and facility is
working well and adds value?
Nick Harvey: Chairman, the operations centre was activated to provide support to the
Regional Maritime Capacity Building mission, which is now called EUCAP Nestor. This
mission has not yet formally launched, so the impact of the activation on the operations
centre is obviously limited. Once it is up and running I think that centre will bring in
increased coherence to EU operations in the Horn of Africa. Operation Atalanta and NATO
Ocean Shield are at Northwood, and that is a very good set-up for the counter-piracy
activity but the centre to deal with EUCAP Nestor is another thing altogether. The UK is
putting forward high quality candidates to serve in that centre, and we will continue to do
everything that we can to make sure that it is a success and that it works closely with
Northwood. So it is early days yet.
Q101 The Chairman: Do we have any UK staff—I am showing my ignorance here—in
the EU operations centre?
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Captain Reindorp: I do not think we have anyone in the EU Operations Centre, although
those posts are rotational so when they rotate we may have one next time. At the moment
I think we have three people designated to go into the region and be part of the Regional
Maritime Capacity Building project.
The Chairman: We have one there I am being told.
Captain Reindorp: If I could just add that this regional maritime capacity is a training
mission, so it is complementary to the high-end fighting counter piracy that is done at sea.
This is the comprehensive bit that goes on ashore to build local capacity to deal with this
issue on their own, and in that way the EU is utterly unique because nobody else is bringing
this to the party at the moment. In that way, the EU is the only one of the coalitions that is
actually looking at this in a holistic view with a strategy designed to have an end date.
Q102 Baroness Young of Hornsey: Can you tell us how successful has the use of
armed guards on commercial vessels been? How many of those that have had armed guards
have been attacked, and how many of those have been captured by pirates in 2011 and
2012? Also, what is the UK’s position on the law in this respect, on the legal and policy
aspects of private armed security on commercial ships? That is enough to start with, and
then there are a couple of supplementary questions to that.
Nick Harvey: I have been provided with a response from the Department for Transport
and I am happy to give a short update on the UK’s view of this issue. But I would say to you
that if you want any more detailed responses, I would suggest that you write to or invite the
Department for Transport in because this is their responsibility and not ours. In the language
that Captain Reindorp used a few minutes ago, this is very firmly a constabulary function.
We do not hold exact figures on the number of UK or international ships that have been
attacked, which have armed guards on board. What we can say is that to date no ship with
private security on board has been successfully hijacked, which I think is a testament to the
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deterrent effect that it has. In many cases, I think, simply the sight of weapons or a single
warning shot is enough to deter the pirates.
In terms of the legal authority that you asked about, Baroness Young, the UK carried out a
full review of the policy of employing armed guards on UK ships and concluded that it should
be allowed in exceptional circumstances, which is defined in the Department for Transport
guidance. The private security company involved must get a Section 5 authorisation from the
Home Office to use prohibited weapons on UK-flagged ships, as it is the UK Firearms Act
that would apply on UK vessels. Different EU member states have differing policies, some of
which either have been or currently are being reviewed. Some member states do allow
private security on board and others do not. Do you want to add anything on that?
Captain Reindorp: Only if I could pick up on your absolute opening point, that we have
reduced piracy to a minimum. Recognising that we will not ever reduce it completely, I think
there are three key components of that. One is the military activity, the other one is best
management practice and perhaps the key one is the embarkation of armed guards. I suspect
if it could ever be analysed that would be the absolute key driver to it.
Q103 Baroness Young of Hornsey: I think in the last session it was that they
mentioned that there were ways of adapting ships, so that they were less prone to be
boarded by pirates. Does that also serve as a deterrent?
Captain Reindorp: This is the best management practice that I refer to—it is another
wonderful piece of phraseology—which is self-protection. This can range from anything from
having an adequate lookout and, as somebody who has been at sea for a while, not all ships
do keep an adequate lookout. They certainly need to in this area. Or it can mean having
razor wire to stop people climbing on your ships or hoses. It also includes having a citadel, a
safe room that the crew can escape to and control the ship from that is impervious to the
pirates.
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Q104 Baroness Young of Hornsey: Just going back to the legal aspects, presumably it
would be a pretty complex tangled situation were somebody to be seriously injured or killed
as a result of action taken by armed guards on a commercial vessel. I know it is a very
general question, but I am just thinking what sorts of issues that could lead to.
Captain Reindorp: It is not an area I am an expert in, but I believe it turns on the
nationality of the ship as determined by its flag, its port of registry, the nationality of the
armed guards doing the shooting and the nationality of the person unfortunate enough to be
shot. It would take a lawyer to untangle that, I am afraid.
Q105 Baroness Young of Hornsey: A couple of other final questions then. How does
the Government plan to review its interim guidance and how has industry engaged with the
review process?
Nick Harvey: This is certainly something where you might want to seek evidence from Mike
Penning, the Shipping Minister at the Department for Transport. In December last year the
Department for Transport published interim guidance to UK-flagged shipping and they
committed to review that within 12 months, so by the end of this year. The rules on the use
of force have recently been revised in response to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee
report on piracy. The full review is taking place in consultation with other Government
departments, with the shipping industry, and indeed with the private security company, so it
is very much something that the Department for Transport is taking evidence on and is
consulting very widely on. Certainly, the shipping industry will be fully consulted during the
review at every stage.
Q106 The Chairman: Just a couple of short things on that. Is the MoD at all involved in
helping training, given the fact that you are the experts on force I suppose?
Nick Harvey: No, emphatically not. That is entirely a matter for the civilian authorities. This
is not a military function. It is a constabulary function and, if the Department for Transport
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and the Home Office thought that it was appropriate for training and support to be given,
that is something I would expect to see the civilian police doing. It is absolutely not a military
function.
Q107 The Chairman: Do you know if there is any indication—and it is early days in
this—that, with increased armed guards, there is a risk of heightened violence that comes
out of that? When we undertook our original report we were rather sceptical about armed
guards, I think wrongly. One of the fears was this would be an escalation in terms of
violence.
Nick Harvey: This is anecdotal rather than scientific but, if anything, the evidence would
seem to be quite the contrary. The very suggestion of a gun getting involved seems to cause
them to turn away fairly promptly.
Captain Reindorp: If I may add, Minister, shooting is the last resort. There are all sorts of
other non-lethal ways that can draw attention to the fact that the pirates are staring down
the barrel of a gun, and most maritime security companies will judge success or failure on
whether they have an engagement or not. Failure is that they have to shoot; success is that
they manage to keep the pirate away before they have to shoot.
Q108 Lord Williams of Elvel: My recollection—and my recollection may be wrong—is
the French Government takes a slightly different view and, in fact, are prepared to provide
marines as armed guards on their flagged ships, on the grounds that their marines are much
better trained and much better disciplined than the private security guards and, therefore,
will provoke less of a threatened violence. Do you see any merits in that argument and, if so,
is the MoD prepared to consider it?
Captain Reindorp: If I could start with the French, I do not have any specific details. I do
know they do it. I do know that they charge a considerable amount, and I do know that they
require a large group of people to go. We have looked at the idea of providing UK service
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personnel on to UK ships and for a variety of reasons we have discounted it. Our belief at
the moment is that the UK contribution is best served in delivering a deter-and-disrupt
effect rather than a protect effect, which is all embarked personnel can do. That is our forte,
the higher end war-fighting part of counter-piracy. I understand—but I am not an expert
in—that there are also legal issues and other issues associated with this as well.
The Chairman: Minister, Captain, thank you very much. We have probably covered
everything, unless there is anything else that you particularly feel that we have not
mentioned or you wish to say. Fine. Thank you both very much indeed. We will try to have
another go, in terms of the actual EU operation but I think that is going to be quite difficult
this time within the timescale. Thank you very much for your evidence and I think we are
hearing from the Foreign Office during the inquiry as well. I hereby declare the end of the
public session.
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Nick Harvey MP, Minister of State for the Armed Forces – Oral
evidence (QQ64 – QQ108)
Evidence to be found under Ministry of Defence
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Alexander Rondos – Oral evidence (QQ176 – QQ234)
Evidence Session No. 5. Heard in Public. Questions 176 - 234
THURSDAY 21 JUNE 2012
10.55 am
Members present
Lord Teverson (Chairman)
Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury
Baroness Eccles of Moulton
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Henig
Lord Inge
Lord Jay of Ewelme
Lord Jopling
Lord Radice
Lord Williams of Elvel
Baroness Young of Hornsey
________________
Examination of Witness
Alexander Rondos, European Union Special Representative for the Horn of Africa.
Q179 The Chairman: Mr Rondos, I very much welcome you to our Committee, and I
was pleased that you could sit in earlier. In fact, there are few people that arrive where you
are with such a strong recommendation from the previous session—made unprompted
without knowing you were there—so that is excellent. We are particularly pleased that you
could respond so quickly to our request to come to this inquiry. Let me just go through the
formalities by saying that this is a public session, which is being webcast and also being
transcribed. We shall send you a copy of the transcription so, if we have made any errors in
the way that it has been recorded, you will be able to correct that.
I know you are very keen to start the session, so perhaps I could ask you to introduce
yourself and say a little bit about how you have got to the position that you are in. The first
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question is also fairly broad and will allow you to give us a run-down of how you see the
situation.
Alexander Rondos: Thank you very much, my Lord Chairman, and thank you all for inviting
me. My name is Alex Rondos. I am a Greek national, although you can tell by my accent that
there have been influences other than Greek in my life—and far profounder than Greek. I
grew up in east Africa, so I am back in some rather familiar territory.
My background is in the world of development and emergency relief, and then slowly I
moved to politics in my own country—I should say that I find Somalia more predictable than
my own country right now so there is a strange consolation in the work I am doing. I have
done a lot of work on Balkans in the last 10 years in my capacity in Greece, where I was a
special adviser to the recent former Prime Minister George Papandreou. Through that I
knew Baroness Ashton and had been able to help a little bit behind the scenes on some
issues there. She knew that I had always been interested in the Horn and eventually asked
me if I would consider this position, which I was very glad to take up. I began in January.
All that I can tell you, in brief, is that my mandate covers Eritrea, Ethiopia, Djibouti, Somalia,
Kenya and Uganda. In the Sudans, there is a special representative—as you know, Dame
Rosalind Marsden—so thank goodness I do not have to go near that one, but we collaborate
a lot because a lot of the issues intersect. I have to cover everything, including Somalia and
Eritrea—I was there last week to see if we could start checking out quite how dodgy it is, as
I noticed you described it. The Nile River basin is another rather worrying issue that has to
be managed carefully. My mandate is wide, but I have been asked to pay particular attention
to Somalia, and that is what I have been doing.
From the outset, I decided just to get out there and I have spent a good deal of time in the
field, actually in Mogadishu, so that I can get the Somalis accustomed to the notion that
remote-control relationships will be a thing of the past. We are going to get back there and
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they are going to get used to having us dealing with them much more directly. That is what I
have been trying to do—it is a more political role that I have tried to assume and have been
asked to assume. Right now, quite frankly, my worry has been that the European Union, as a
whole, tends to get viewed in much of that part of the world as a cash cow to be milked at
will. That has to end. My job is, in effect, to say, “Well, if you want our cash, there is a series
of other parallel discussions we are going to have regarding politics, security and the like
before we just dish out money”. I am putting it with a broad sweep, but that is really the
intent with which I have been asked to assume my responsibilities. If I may, I will just leave it
at that.
Q180 The Chairman: Yes, indeed. Thank you. That is very useful as an introduction.
Perhaps I could move on and ask; how do you assess the situation in Somalia itself, its
provinces of Puntland and Somaliland—which sometimes seem completely different
universes to us back here—and, indeed, the wider Horn of Africa?
Alexander Rondos: To the situation in Somalia, the word “optimism” cannot ever—and will
not for a while yet—be attached with Somalia, but there is no doubt that we are seeing
some changes that I think take us in a positive direction. On the political front, we have all
been engaged, as has the current leadership of Somalia, in ending a transition. Now, we need
to be very clear here that we do not get lost in semantics. The formal transitional
Government will end, but the real work of transition in Somalia begins only now. I think that
we need to be very clear about that. It is going to take a year or two for things to settle, if—
as one hopes—things continue to move in the right direction.
What does that mean? This change in August is about a new political dispensation arrived at
without elections. I think we must understand that frame. In order to legitimise it, one has
turned to the very traditional structures of the clan elders, who are traditionally those who
endorse much that goes on socially within the country. So, as we speak, there are about 130
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clan elders gathered in Mogadishu who are selecting the members of the constituent
assembly. That should, we hope, in the next two or three weeks, be a finished task. They will
do two things: they will select—I use the word “select”—a Parliament and they will also
start reviewing and commenting on the constitution, which is about now to be made public
as a draft constitution. That is the political process.
My own view is that, in the next eight weeks, there will be a bumpy landing but this plane
will land on the airstrip, as it were. It is what follows afterwards that is the key. I am sure
that there will be a new political dispensation and there will be a leadership. We may see
some familiar faces and we have to work out how we handle that. Having heard the earlier
testimony, I think that the challenge is going to be how one gradually folds into the politics of
Somalia those parts and regions—I am talking specifically about those that have been under
the authority of al-Shabaab until lately—in south central Somalia. As they are brought back
under control, how politically they are represented and folded into the politics of Somalia is
the hard politics of what people are going to have to manage well. That is certainly what I
tell my colleagues in the meetings that I have with other international authorities. With a
light touch, we have to make sure this does not spill over and get out of control. That is the
heart of the game.
Puntland seems to chug along quite well on its own. There is a vestige of law and order;
there is a form of government. I think Puntland has very wisely demonstrated that it is as
well to show and put on a good track record because, when the real debate comes of what
degree of federalism should exist in Somalia—and that is the debate, constitutionally—
Puntland can justify its pitch that it would like to be relatively autonomous within a federal
constitution. I think that is its game.
Somaliland, as I think you all know very well, has proven that it is capable of standing up and
attending to itself. However, it has a vital interest, whatever its constitutional future and fate,
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in making sure the rest of Somalia is secure and stable. The one thing that it cannot afford,
whether it is independent or not, is to have an unstable Somalia. That is why it is very
encouraging that these discussions are actually occurring at Chevening right now.
The Chairman: Thank you. That is very good and useful introduction.
Q181 Lord Jay of Ewelme: Thank you. Before I come on to Operation Atalanta, you
said you had spent some time in Mogadishu. Could you just tell us to what extent is
Mogadishu a functioning town or functioning city now? Some of us have been to other rather
nasty places, Duber and Gomer and so on. But, where is Mogadishu now on the scale of
other more or less functioning African cities?
Alexander Rondos: Somalia is a very strange place in the sense that—if I said to you, it is an
economy without a state. Mogadishu is bustling. I mean it. It is lovely. Anyone who has
known Somalia and eastern Africa, the colours are back, the markets are open. It is just
lovely. The sad fact is that people like myself have to go around with a flak jacket in an
armoured personnel carrier; I wish I could go and just join in.
It is an interesting little litmus test, but it hit me when a Somali businessman decided to put
up glass in his shop front window in Mogadishu. Then I said, “Either the guy’s a complete
fool or he knows something that we all do not really know.” So, Somalis are taking their
money back in, the planes are full. They are coming back. They are bringing money, they are
trying to invest. Houses are being rebuilt. In fact, there is a shortage of labour in Garowe in
Puntland, because they are all coming down to Mogadishu because there is so much demand
for labour, the masons and the like. Now, this is all anecdotal, but I hope it does begin to
give you a picture of a place that is beginning to take off.
Now, the interesting question is why. Here we have to register and acknowledge a success.
We all collectively, and Britain has played a major role in this, have been financing and
supporting the African Union forces. They have delivered the security. So, it is our collective
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treasure but African blood has been spilt to achieve this. This is very unusual and rather
special, as it were. So, the African Union forces are there. They have cleared the place up.
Yes, we are going to get constant—it is the asymmetric attacks that will come from Al-
Shabaab. That will continue, we must be quite realistic. But the fact that Somalis are
returning, they are investing.
On the economy, you are beginning to feel an economy in Mogadishu. We must maintain
that, because it then becomes the beacon for the rest of the country. Especially what is
currently still under al-Shabaab control.
Q182 Lord Jay of Ewelme: We will come on to Atalanta in a second, but what we have
been hearing quite a lot is that the anti-piracy operations are only going to work if there is
also a degree of development on land. That approach, that model, would you say that is
plausible?
Alexander Rondos: Absolutely. It is not only plausible, but necessary.
Lord Jay of Ewelme: I know it is necessary.
Alexander Rondos: Oh, yes. It is. Yes. Earlier I think I heard people made mention of
stabilisation. I think this is an absolutely critical issue and it links into the question about
Atalanta and how one deals with piracy. The challenge in Somalia right now is to make sure
that one can synchronise the establishment of civil administration with the advance of the
military. Because as AMISOM clears with its Somali allies, local allies or the Ethiopians clear
areas up, the issue is who moves in and establishes a degree of governance, law and order so
that the citizens can turn around and say, “Well, this is better than Shabaab rule” at the very
least. Now, I believe that in the next year this is the strategic challenge in Somalia. But we
also have to be very imaginative and also widen the angle of the geographic lens. We should
not simply be talking about the stabilisation of areas, if you will, retrieved from Shabaab
control. It is the stabilisation of the entire country, including the coastal areas.
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What does stabilisation mean? Having a modicum of decent Government. You are not
shooting each other and you are part of a decent economy, or an economy that is
functioning. That is why extending the notion of stabilisation and investing in the coastal
areas becomes an absolute key in offering an alternative incentive to communities for whom,
in most instances, and clearly now, reluctantly feel they need to allow or tolerate piracy to
operate from near their communities.
Q183 Lord Jay of Ewelme: Thank you very much for that. Coming on to Atalanta, how
do you think that has performed? How well has it performed in the last couple of years and
what would you see as having been its main achievements in the combating of piracy? A
subsequent point, which we did discuss with Nick Kay and others, is that clearly something
needs to continue beyond 2014. Do you see that happening? How much longer is one going
to have to have a naval operation offshore?
Alexander Rondos: Let us not forget Atalanta is one of a variety of presences in that part of
the Indian Ocean, but Atalanta has been the most active. Now, my assessment would be that
it has done a very impressive job when you think of how a relatively few ships cover a
geographic area that is the size of Europe, in effect. The effect has been quite striking, and I
think that speaks also to the imagination and skill with which the operation has been
commanded from the military, from the naval side. I do want to acknowledge that. Since I
came to my duties it has been Admiral Potts, and it has been the way it has been run. An
awful lot of what they do never comes to the public eye. So let me just drill a little deeper
on that issue.
Firstly, what we have noticed is certainly the attacks by pirates have diminished. There are
far fewer ships now that are held and there are fewer seafarers who are held hostage. But
they are still there and that is a tragic condition that they are in. Now, what the pirates have
been doing is getting mother-ships, so they are extending way, way—it is 1,000 nautical miles
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and beyond—into the Indian Ocean. What I think Atalanta has also been able to do is locate
and chase down the mother-ships. So they are spreading far and wide rather successfully.
That is regarding Atalanta proper.
Then, what we referred to as the disruption of pirate logistical dumps action was taken,
which indeed was very limited. There were two things to bear in mind on that. Firstly, it was
rather useful that the European Union agreed to, if you will, fire shots in anger—if I may put
it that way—and to do it having said it might do it. That is an interesting signal and I, who
have to travel politically in the region, have sensed a difference. At head of Government level
people are saying, “By golly, you actually did it”. It is an interesting political reaction one gets.
Secondly, there are very few caveats on this. Having been given a green light, Admiral Potts
and his commanders can pick and choose when they want to do the next, and that will
depend on climate opportunity and the like. So this is like a Damocles sword that hangs over
the various pirate groups, and they know that at some point it may happen again. It has that
simple effect of, if you will, breaking little bits of the chain that constitute the business of
piracy.
Q184 Lord Jay of Ewelme: On going on after 2014, can you give a brief overview on
that point?
Alexander Rondos: I am sorry, absolutely. Between now and 2014 I think several things
would need to be done if we feel we have a serious exit strategy for Atalanta, if we want to
put it that way. First of all the programme now referred to as EUCAP Nestor has to get
going, and that is why it is more than timely that it begins hopefully this summer. Secondly, I
think within the context of that it is a question of training and equipment and of getting the
various countries really to buy into this. The eastern coast of Africa is, if you will, the wild
west of the littoral of the Indian Ocean—let us put it that way—and it is time to put some
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order there. Let us get local sheriffs trained to do it well in coastal maritime. That is the
objective. If we can start moving on this fast, then I think we begin to have a real effect.
Somaliland and Puntland are fine—this is again going to come back to the issue of the
stabilisation of south central Somalia. It is from right up below Puntland down to Kismayo
and below. That area has to come back under control and be properly policed, as it were. If
we have that then I think we can look ahead to 2014 with some degree of hope, and that
must be matched with real investment from the development side into the east coastal
communities.
Q185 Lord Jay of Ewelme: Do you see the possibility, therefore, of Atalanta not
continuing beyond 2014, or do you assume that in some way or another it will be rolled
over?
Alexander Rondos: It may have to be rolled over. It is very difficult to tell. We cannot
afford to find ourselves in the position in late 2014 where we are saying we have done
nothing towards an exit strategy. The hydraulics will be there, and we will have to assess
that by mid to autumn 2014.
Q186 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: We have heard from other sessions
about the problems of what to do with pirates once captured and, indeed, last week we
were told there were an estimated 2,000 pirates currently awaiting trial and that
prosecution is more likely to happen if there is a possibility of transferring these prisoners
out of the countries where they have been captured. Which countries that have agreed to
take pirates for prosecution are most in need of support and assistance? What, in your view,
can the EU offer and what does it offer?
Alexander Rondos: The ones that have been most helpful, obviously, are the Seychelles and
Mauritius, but the Seychelles has a capacity problem. They actually have their own criminals
also to deal with, and I think that is an issue that we should treat with the greatest
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understanding and sympathy. Puntland and Somaliland have offered and have helped. I was
listening to some of the earlier conversation you were having on this, and I think the prisons
that have been built to deal with pirates are in fact pretty good. I had our people check so
that we can be sure of that.
There is a very interesting challenge here that we are talking about 2,000 people so far. I
want to step back a bit to pose a larger question—which I must confess I posed within our
system in the EU—which is that we have programmes for the demilitarisation of militias, we
do training programmes for the demobilisation of people who have been killing on behalf of
warlords in Somalia. We do this all over the world, such programmes. The pirates that are
captured, many of these are just kids, they are like the mules for drug runners. They are
intimidated—
Q187 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: Are they all male? are they all men?
Alexander Rondos: Yes, I think so. I am sure the report would have come in very quickly if
a female pirate had been found, but to my knowledge, yes. I think there is a broader issue
here. We need to ask ourselves once we get them: how long are we going to keep a 17 year
old kid who has been put on to a ship and told to go out and possibly make a bit of money
on the side? Are we going to keep them in prison for 15 years, or is there something else
we could possibly do? I would love to catch the kingpins who have been running all of this
and put them away for life. That is one thing, but—
Q188 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: Would it all collapse if the kingpins were
eliminated?
Alexander Rondos: It would probably make a huge—yes, absolutely. This is organised
crime. Piracy is now a speculative exercise. The thing that we already have to be thinking of
is that, if piracy is no longer lucrative, the worrying thing is that these are people who are
probably sufficiently organised to move into illicit movement of guns, drugs or people.
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Q189 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: So they have to be the target?
Alexander Rondos: Yes, and so that is what we must get to. Sorry, I have drifted from your
question, but I wanted to put it in a broader context.
Puntland and Somaliland already do it. In Somalia, Mogadishu do not even consider it—no
one would when they have trouble just keeping their own prisoners. It is just out of the
question. So the question then is: are there any other countries that could do it? Countries
like Kenya and Tanzania are understanding but are a bit reluctant to throw themselves fully
into it.
There has been a parallel discussion, as I am sure you are aware, as to where should people
be tried. There was one suggestion that Arusha should be turned into a centre. I noticed
recently that a country in the Gulf offered to set up an international court for this but we do
still have a problem, which is: when they are captured, what are the judicial procedures by
which pirates can then be taken from whatever is the flag country to be tried somewhere?
That still remains an overall challenge. There is no doubt about that.
Q190 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: Just picking up on what you said, which
was very interesting, about the youth of a lot of the pirates and whether we want to throw
them in prison and throw away the key, I asked last week about the EU development fund
and was told that it is to go towards general support. Is that something that could be used in
rehabilitation, as it were?
Alexander Rondos: Yes, with anything that is a programme that could be developed and
that shows it could deliver some results, our systems would and should look at it.
Q191 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: So a rehabilitation programme of some
kind is something that you are looking at?
Alexander Rondos: I have asked. I want to be clear: I have absolutely no line authority in
the EU—I am like an envoy. So what I do is raise questions and try to prod systems. I cannot
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and do not want to commit the system in any way, but to me it is just absolutely logical. We
do this everywhere else in the world for all sorts of other people who actually do even
nastier things.
The Chairman: Let us move on. Lord Jopling, I know we have gone through some of these
issues, but probably you would like to pursue one or two of them.
Q192 Lord Jopling: I wonder if you would tell us how effective you believe the
prosecution and sentencing has been of pirates up to now, and to what extent it could be
improved? You have talked about countries that might assist in doing this. I have always been
rather surprised that some of the very rich Gulf states have not been prepared to assist over
this because, after all, they have a great interest in the transportation of oil. I have always
been surprised that people have not talked about the willingness or failure of the Gulf states.
I was also very interested in a point we just did latch on to a few moments ago. We have
been sent a report of your press conference two days ago in Brussels, which says,
“Therefore it was important to pursue the financiers of piracy through judicial means.” That
maybe sounds rather an optimistic aim. How practical is it in fact to get at those people who
are well protected in an area where judicial means are pretty minimal?
Then finally, of the prisons you are talking about in Somalia, are the UN building just one? I
asked this previously and did not receive a good answer. How many inmates will they take,
and is it not unbelievable that the UN people there are not armed? Sorry, that is a whole
string of questions.
Alexander Rondos: That is fine. Let me start with the last because I do not think I can
answer it adequately, frankly, and what I would like to do is go and ask my system to come
up with all the facts and send them to you and to the Committee. I think that is the fairest
way to deal with it. I would just be fluffing it in the mean time.
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Regarding the Gulf, interestingly I am going to Dubai next week—in fact, Minister of State
Bellingham will be there as well—for an anti-piracy conference. The Gulf does take an
interest. It has been certainly my view, and the view of several of us in the European Union,
that there is a larger issue here. It is not just the Gulf and anti-piracy; it is the Gulf and the
Horn of Africa. They have an historical link that long predates our presence there. It is a
religious link, they are at trade, everything. So I think given the degree of our investment in
the Horn, it is time we engaged the Gulf in a real serious political discussion. We use this
word “transparency”, and indeed we are very open with what we do, so we would like to
see some, if you will, reciprocal behaviour from the Gulf. There is heavy investment going
from the Gulf. There is a lot of trade. We would like to engage them and say, “We are not
exclusive by any means, but could we all see if we are on the same sheet of music regarding
what our intentions are for this region?” Within that context is the piracy. The United Arab
Emirates have in fact put up some money and have opened up the possibility that we should
have a joint discussion with them—when I say we, I mean the European Union—about doing
some things jointly regarding anti-piracy, and that is one of the purposes why I am going to
go and spend two or three days there. But I want to emphasise the context is a much
broader one, and I would like to engage them much more on that.
When I used the words “judicial means” I probably am not being sufficiently expert—I used
the wrong word. What I mean quite simply is we need to conduct fast, deep, forensic,
criminal investigations that are global about who is making money and using money to
finance piracy. That is what I mean. I do not care what means are used, but the sooner we
get hold of these people the better.
Q193 Lord Jopling: In an almost throw-away remark you said, if I caught you right, that
Henry Bellingham is going to an anti-piracy conference—
Alexander Rondos: That is what I was told just outside by Nick Kay.
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Lord Jopling: Did we know that?
The Chairman: I do not think that we know it. I am not aware that we know it.
Lord Jopling: It is news to me.
Alexander Rondos: I understood that there is to be representation from the UK.
Q194 Lord Jopling: You are going to it?
Alexander Rondos: I am going to it.
Q195 Lord Jopling: Who is convening it?
Alexander Rondos: The United Arab Emirates. It is within the context of the International
Contact Group, I think, on piracy, and it is within that the UAE once or twice a year does a
big conference.
Lord Jopling: Because that seems to be significant and we had not picked it up until now,
so I think that is something we need to have a look at.
The Chairman: Indeed, yes.
Q196 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: Could I ask you about getting at the kingpins, which
seems to be such an absolutely vital way of stopping the piracy more or less? The kingpins
and financiers are obviously the same people in most things, and then there will be links right
through until you get to these unfortunate young men actually on the boats. It makes one
think of beggar masters and mafia and all sorts of not particularly closely related equivalents.
It is a question of how much the pirates who are being held and prosecuted know about
who the people are who are, as it were, their ultimate bosses, and to what extent that
knowledge can be legitimately used and extracted. Maybe they do not know very much
because there are so many stages in-between, but it seems to be a possible source of lead
back to the root, as it were.
Alexander Rondos: Absolutely, and the people that are investigating are on to that already.
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Q197 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: I am just interested by this press cutting
we have about links between the mafia and Somali pirates that you are quoted as having
been looking into. Is that the case?
Alexander Rondos: I just do not know. I am aware—
Q198 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: It says here you are looking into it.
Alexander Rondos: Yes, but we just find out—
Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury: It is just for the record.
Alexander Rondos: No, absolutely. There is a fellow based in Paris who did some research
and claims that this occurs. But people better equipped than I need to go into our system
and check and see. It is a neck of the woods that is so strange that anything is possible, but it
also allows anyone with a lively imagination to concoct any type of conspiracy theory so we
have to try and navigate in that one.
Q199 Lord Inge: You were talking about the new aid. What are you hoping to get out of
it? Are any of the other Gulf states showing any real interest in it?
Alexander Rondos: They all have stated that they are interested. What I would like to get
out of it, as I was mentioning earlier, is to establish a degree of, if you will, conversation with
the much higher levels of leadership there and engage them in a discussion with us and the
European Union on two or three key points about the Horn, about security, about some of
the political relations that exist and then on things like anti-piracy.
Let me put it really quite bluntly. We have a tendency to say, “Well, if we go to the Gulf, the
only thing we are going to do there is go and ask them for money”, and they do not take
kindly to that. So there is a different conversation that needs to be had and the type of
conversation I would like us to develop with them in the Gulf is to say, “We, the European
Union and the west, are financing a very substantial military operation carried out by
Africans to bring security to a region that actually brings security to the whole of the Gulf. In
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that context, therefore, could we not possibly see how we share some of the costs, or are
we just going to foot this bill forever, and just be the nice people and someone else’s useful
idiot?”, if I may put it crudely. That is the type of conversation I would like to have and just
see where it takes us.
Q200 Lord Inge: If they were to volunteer to provide some of their capabilities, would
you like that or not?
Alexander Rondos: Absolutely, why not if it is within the framework that we are all agreed?
Q201 Lord Inge: The reason I ask that question is because they get fed up with us asking
them for money.
Alexander Rondos: Precisely, exactly, and there is no reason why we should not share the
burden in all sorts of ways.
The Chairman: It is an interesting area of investigation.
Q202 Lord Jopling: Can I come back to the point that I raised first of all on the issue of
the Gulf? Do you see any possibility of them helping with prosecuting and imprisoning?
Alexander Rondos: I think it is possible and it is one of the things I would like—
Q203 Lord Jopling: Because that would help enormously.
Alexander Rondos: I agree with you completely. We should pursue that further, and I think
Qatar has already indicated that it would be open to a discussion, but I would like to see
which other of the Emirates would also like to talk and whether the Saudis want to discuss
the matter. I agree with you completely.
Q204 The Chairman: Do the Iranians take any interest in this area at all?
Alexander Rondos: You bet. It is fascinating. Let me put it this way; it is funny there are
some issues—and anti-piracy is one—that brings strange groups of people together for a
common purpose.
Q205 The Chairman: So we wait and listen. Good, okay.
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Alexander Rondos: It is very interesting. If I were a pirate I would not want to be caught by
the Iranians, judging from the recent record of Iranian reaction to pirates.
Q206 Lord Williams of Elvel: I have a very quick question on this operation against a
pirate base. Does this mark a fundamental change in policy? In other words, will there be
repeated attacks and, if so, what is the legality for these operations? What would the
reaction of the neighbouring countries be?
Alexander Rondos: They could be repeated because the legal basis upon which this latest
attack occurred was the member states of the EU reviewed and came up with a clear set of
rules of engagement and authority and what is “go” and “no go” for the operational
commander. The case has been made that there is a way in which—or rather the instruction
is clear legally, and that is mandated by the Council of the European Union, so that is the
legal basis. But within that context they have been told that they are authorised to go after
these dumps from which the pirates operate and to make sure that absolutely every
measure is taken to avoid civilian loss of life.
It is entirely up to the operational commander from now on if he chooses to launch another
assault, and it all depends on the season as well, but it is entirely up to him. So there may be
others, and I will not know—or will only know hours before—if he chooses to do that. But
we are entering into the rainy season, which makes it more complicated. I hope I have
addressed the legality—
Q207 The Chairman: Sorry, could I just check on this because clearly we are not in the
19th century any more and Europe cannot decide it is just going to intervene on the
territorial integrity of African states. Presumably, there is a UN background to this.
Alexander Rondos: Yes, absolutely. With the Somali Government, for example, the coastal
states were asked to offer their approval and action would not have been taken without
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that, and that was a precondition for actually being able to proceed with the operation. Yes,
thank you for correcting me.
Q208 Lord Williams of Elvel: The views of the surrounding—
Alexander Rondos: The reactions I have received—the official reaction—has been
satisfactory. They may not want to state it publicly, but they are delighted. This is a scourge
and I can well understand there is no need to make a noise about it, but they have
communicated their satisfaction.
Q209 Lord Inge: How effective do you think the European Union training mission to
Somalia has been, and how are the preparations that you get notice of progressing?
Alexander Rondos: By the training mission you mean what we do in Uganda where we train
the EUTM? My assessment is that it has been very good. Why? First of all, we have been able
to identify, or find a way of identifying the right types of recruit. That was when an early
lesson was learned so it is not just purely a clan-based affair; there is a spread from around
the country from different clans brought together. Secondly, taking them away to Uganda
means that they have been given, my military colleagues assure me, a first-rate training.
Thirdly, these people—
Q210 Lord Inge: Sorry, can I just interrupt, did they come from throughout Somalia, or
do you take the southern ones and northern ones or what?
Alexander Rondos: Throughout, with the exception of Somaliland, but the attempt is
constantly to mix from different clans. That is what becomes important because if you do
not do that, what you end up doing is training people who are clan based who at any time
can become another clan militia. The object is to try to create—
Lord Inge: Whereas in the British Army we do actually base it on clans.
Alexander Rondos: But somehow the regimental system—
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Q211 Lord Inge: I know it is slightly different, but behind that is a serious question
because mixing them sounds easy on paper but how easy is it in practice?
Alexander Rondos: It is not easy. The idea behind it is if a Somali national army is needed,
the structure of command especially in the officer corps is going to have to be one that is
able to reach beyond pure clan-based interests. That has been the thinking behind it and in
fact this training mission now is increasingly going to focus on the middle-ranking officer
training. It has been very effective. The challenge is the following: by the end of, say, next
year, 3,000 or 4,000 people will have been trained. That maketh not a national army, so the
debate that goes on that we are all engaged in is: what then is the broader programme for
security sector reform? Are we creating an army? Are we trying to create a national
gendarmerie? What is it that is needed, and who is going to invest in this?
Q212 Lord Inge: What have we lain down at the moment is the basic role of an army?
Alexander Rondos: To protect the frontiers and to protect the country from attack. That is
what it is.
Q213 Lord Inge: External attack? Nothing to do with internally at all?
Alexander Rondos: No, and yet they are involved in attack right now because they are
attacking Shabelle. They are operating alongside the AMISOM forces.
If I may, you asked me about the other programme, EUCAP Nestor. My hope is this is going
to get off the ground fast. Again, I want to go back to what we were talking about earlier, I
think there is a need for a conversation with the Gulf countries, who have a vital interest in
the success of this. The maritime security of Somalia is of vital interest to them. They are
willing to invest, and they want to do something jointly and we need to take that a step
further.
Q214 Lord Inge: Are you talking about investment, or what are you talking about as far
as the Gulf states are concerned?
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Alexander Rondos: It is not clear. They have already indicated—
Q215 Lord Inge: You say “they”. They all have, have they?
Alexander Rondos: I am talking about the UAE. The UAE has expressed an interest in
working together. We are providing what we refer to as capacity building—in other words,
we are providing skills or training for skills. Sooner or later someone is going to have to
provide the kit to do this, and therein lies the issue, and that is where we need to broaden
the discussion out in my view, because only when we have achieved that can we really talk
about an exit strategy for Atalanta and we will have begun to truly police the coastline
effectively.
Lord Inge: That is quite a big task.
Alexander Rondos: Very big. I agree with you entirely.
Q216 Baroness Henig: I have a number of questions. The first one actually relates to
your appointment. I see in the first instance you were appointed for six months. I am
assuming that will be renewed at the end of June since that comes to an end quite soon.
Alexander Rondos: I was not going to come here for a farewell visit, no.
Q217 Baroness Henig: So how is that working then? You are appointed for six months
in the first instance—
Alexander Rondos: Yes, and then it is renewed for a year, and it has been—
Q218 Baroness Henig: So it has just been renewed for a year, and then—
Alexander Rondos: Yes as of 1 July it starts again for a year.
Q219 Baroness Henig: Is it a rolling year or—
Alexander Rondos: Yes.
Q220 Baroness Henig: So it will continue?
Alexander Rondos: Yes, unless the member states choose to discontinue me at any point.
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Q221 Baroness Henig: Clearly, in practice you describe yourself as an envoy, from
which I take it that your concept of this is that you will be based out there for most of the
time rather than in Brussels or Athens? How do you see the way you operate in practice?
Alexander Rondos: I will, I think, spend at least half of my time if not more—that is what I
have been doing already—in the region. Part of my task is also to do exactly what I am doing
today—and I consider it a fundamental obligation—which is to come to the member states
and the Parliaments and the like and explain what this is. After all it is you all, and in every
other country, who are voting serious funds and otherwise endorsing what we do. So I
regard it as my obligation also to come back and report. That takes up a good deal of time,
and then I have to be in Brussels, which I am still discovering—that is the only way I can put
it.
Baroness Henig: That takes time as well, I would think, yes.
Alexander Rondos: I am not sure I will ever learn entirely, but it is complicated.
Q222 Baroness Henig: In terms of support, are you quite happy so far? I think you are
absolutely right that you need to go around the member countries and that is a way of
making sure you do get support. What do you need to be effective in this role? Do you have
everything at the moment that you need from the member states, or is there more that you
need?
Alexander Rondos: One could always want more of everything. No, I am perfectly content
because I have taken the view that I want to be very targeted in the sense that there is no
point in me interfering in operation issues. What I have to make sure of is—there is a
regional issue here. Somalia is a regional issue, so very few people are given the authority to
try to stitch the region together, and the fundamental question I am asking myself is: in this
region that is marred by multiple flash-points, which become very ugly very quickly, can we
eventually start thinking of how we build an architecture for security so these countries can
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find ways of avoiding coming to blows? Right now we have invasions on order and at will
occurring—incursions occur all over the place. This is the Balkans in 1992, let me put it that
way. So my task is to start doing more and more with, if you like, the shuttling that can begin
to bring people together. The support I need is more the access to be able to talk at the
right levels in the member states so that everyone understands what it is I think needs to be
done and what my recommendations are. I keep a very small team, and that is the way I
prefer to do it, so I prefer to have a tight little ship that can move fast.
Baroness Henig: Yes, and yours is very much a strategic role then. That is how you are
seeing it. Thank you.
Q223 The Chairman: How do you feel you interact with the External Action Service
and the heads of mission in some of the states that you cover? Is that straightforward or
how do you use their own expertise? How does that work?
Alexander Rondos: Absolutely. I draw on them because they have a lot of expertise that is
local. They have all been very welcoming because in many ways I can do certain things that
are very difficult. They are bound by the boundaries within which they operate, not so much
bureaucratically but geographically; I am able to move and, if you will, connect certain dots
that help—for example, someone in Nairobi dealing with Addis Ababa and talking to the
leadership of both countries.
Q224 The Chairman: How many heads of mission are in your patch, Mr Rondos? Just to
give us an idea.
Alexander Rondos: Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti, Somalia. Six.
Q225 The Chairman: Are you anticipating having your own office out there at all?
Alexander Rondos: Yes, precisely because of the relative flexibility we have, and frankly at a
little bit of my insistence that we have to fly the flag in Mogadishu, I have been asked if I, as
the EU Special Representative, will open an office in Mogadishu so that is beginning as we
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speak. I received the authorisation from the member states to do that, and a modest budget,
so I will have always two to three people in Mogadishu. That way we will be the eyes and
ears, and hopefully the ones who are talking to the system in Somalia as well as working with
AMISOM and the others.
Q226 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: Could I ask: how does that link up with flak jackets
and armoured vehicles? You must have to have a very secure establishment and that is
costly.
Alexander Rondos: Absolutely, yes. My budget was just approved a few days ago on that.
Q227 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: You likened what is happening now in Somalia to
the Balkans in 1992, does that mean there is some ethnic cleansing going on?
Alexander Rondos: No. I was using the analogy in a different way. It is more a broader
region I am talking about. Look at Sudan. Right now we have fighting going on somewhere in
the middle of Sudan. With Eritrea and Ethiopia, there are daily hostilities on the frontier up
there; in Somalia, there is actually a campaign, with daily fighting. That could easily be broken
down to endless separate little battles, but those are more under control. But if you sit back
and look at this picture, this region is a series of flash-points and we are held hostage by
each one of them. That is where I liken it a bit to the Balkans. Every time someone decides
to cause trouble we just become transfixed by that and are sucked into this particular issue
without sitting back and saying, “Is there a broader framework we can put to, if you will,
herd the cats?” It is not easy.
Q228 Baroness Eccles of Moulton: Is this clan versus clan, is it?
Alexander Rondos: In the case within Somalia it tends to be that, but then al-Shabaab puts
the Jihadist overlay on it. So it is not entirely just clan versus clan; it is the marginalised who
have turned to a Jihadi agenda. It is very mixed. But in the broader region it is your classic
frontier disputes between cattle rustlers and who controls a bit of land. It is irredentism—
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that is the elephant in the room in the whole of the Horn of Africa, and that is why Kenya
and Ethiopia are very intrusive because they have very large Somali minorities on the
Ogaden and in the northern territories of Kenya. So there are various causes.
Q229 Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: You said you were planning some recommendations
about what needs to be done. I wanted to look at the root causes of the problem. These
kingpins, as you described them, for their muscle they get these unemployed young people
from Somalia; they get unemployed fishermen for their navigational skills who know the sea.
You have described Somalia’s economy as improving. We need to look at some targeted
programmes for unemployed youngsters or fishermen who are going to be recruited to do
this. Are you going to be looking at that?
Alexander Rondos: Absolutely, it has already begun. The challenge is access. The ideas are
there and the programmes can be done, but the issue is this. In an ideal world, you could say
we are going to take some money and we are going to risk it. We are going to send it to
those coastal communities that we cannot even visit, and therefore we cannot be sure we
can account for the money. If I were a private sector risk investor for the promotion of the
coastal communities, I would say I am going to take 3% of my annual turnover and I am going
to risk it. I would do it that way, just to check. This is the real challenge because the auditors
will come and they will say, “Can you prove how your money has been spent?” That is what
blocks the system.
Q230 Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: How much is IGAD involved in this kind of planning?
Alexander Rondos: To a certain extent one of my conclusions reached after my first few
months is that actually we need as EU to engage more with IGAD and help give them more
capacity. If we are working on the assumption the best structures for the whole of Africa are
regional organisations, this is the sum of how you build up security. You have ECOWAS in
the west and you have the East African Community. IGAD should begin to play that role in
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that part of the Horn. I think there is ample room to do more and for the countries to pitch
in and accept a wider role.
Q231 Lord Foulkes of Cumnock: If we come out with a report suggesting specifics in
relation to that, would it be helpful in strengthening your arm for help?
Alexander Rondos: Absolutely, yes. Please, emphasise stabilisation: let us wake up and get
going on stabilisation generally in Somalia. In the next 18 months, even where access is
difficult and you cannot do the very long term programmes, there is a gap between end of
conflict and the ability to install serious development programmes. You have to fill that space
fast. That is first. Secondly, the coastal communities are critical. Thirdly, what is the
structure regionally that can become the catalyst, if not the engine, for bringing people
together—to be the forum, as it were, where serious thinking politics but also programmes
can occur? Please, I would welcome it.
Q232 Baroness Young of Hornsey: Your comments on that interest me. My question
is mainly about EU development and the humanitarian aid, but you talked just now about this
gap between the end of conflict and the next phase. Do you think the EU aid as it is
currently set up is able to fill that gap? Is there something you can see in the future that
would work to ensure that transition period is effective?
Alexander Rondos: I think we are bound in the EU by all sorts of rules and so I want to be
very clear about that. The staff of the EU that I see in the field I think would be happy to
plunge into all sorts of programmes, but it is their necks—not physically, but
professionally—that are on the line because people then ask, “Through whom do you give
the money, how can you account for it?” That is one. Having said that, I think there is a
much broader question that applies certainly to the EU, and I have discussed it with
colleagues here in Britain. We have a lot of cases around the world where we now need to
start understanding what you do when conflict ends. Which is the best way of doing it? I am
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not sure we have the answers yet. There is too much theology and not enough practice
going on at the moment. Right now we are fighting a war, which we are possibly winning
and, by golly, we need to consolidate that victory and we have no time to sit and have
seminars. That is the issue.
Who are the types of agencies? This gets you into very interesting territory. There is the
United Nations, which does a lot because we as the EU are really non-operational. We
finance others—it is very important to bear that in mind. So we finance a lot to the UN. I
think it is time to talk to the UN a bit about how in certain circumstances they can move
with an alacrity that is equal to the occasion. That I think might be needed.
There is a wide array of NGOs who do very good work but very often you cannot go and
supervise. An NGO does not have an interest in making a mess of a programme. If they do,
it is because politically something went wrong. I would be more liberal in my attitude to that
and be willing to take the risk.
We then come into a very interesting issue, especially in Somalia. Unlike in other parts of
the world—I take a place like Ethiopia 20 or 25 years ago, when I worked in NGOs there; it
was the domain of all the Christian NGOs because it was a Christian country—we are in
Somalia, which is Muslim. In areas where al-Shabaab controlled, they do not want to see the
Christians at all. The only agencies that have access are Muslim NGOs. If you are looking at
it completely objectively and you say, “How can we reach people who are in need?” then
you get together with the Muslim NGOs and you finance them. It is as simple as that. But
they are not part of the traditional systems that you are all accustomed to here. So I think
there is another very interesting discussion to be had with all these agencies that belong to
countries that are part of the Organisation of Islamic Conferences and the like, some of
which are very good. What I would like to see is them talking more with our NGOs and the
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like, because the reality is now, in Somalia, access is in the hands of countries like Turkey
and NGOs that come from the Muslim world. It is as simple as that.
Q233 Baroness Young of Hornsey: That is very interesting and points to the need for
more imagination, flexibility, putting aside some cultural baggage and so on in order to effect
that change. Just going on to talk about how successful the EU development and
humanitarian aid has been in Somalia and how that has been disbursed, I wonder if you could
give us your views on that and perhaps say a little bit about how you think that success has
been measured? Also, in view of your last comments, might there need to be some different
way of thinking about what success looks like? Sorry, that is a big barrage of questions.
Alexander Rondos: Yes, I know. There is a very interesting issue, very broadly at the
moment, before I get to the specific question. The EU, for the first time—unlike, say, what
you are accustomed to here in Britain—is getting used to the idea that it is doing diplomacy,
defence and development. The system is still getting used to that, and it is both conceptual
and political. How do we avoid the gears grinding and getting the machinery of the EU to
understand how you synchronise and plan all these things together? That is the very broad
context because that then raises questions about what is development, where is the
humanitarian, and what are the various options. Now, specifically on the humanitarian and
developmental, my own view is it is very good. It is effective and they choose good partners.
I think what often frustrates the EU officials themselves is that they would love to be able to
move more quickly but the rules are that things have to be very carefully planned, and all the
rest of it, for reasons of accountability. So, yes, when a programme is up and running, on the
whole, it is really rather good.
On the humanitarian stuff, I have to take my hat off to the people at ECHO, which is the EU
humanitarian organisation. Last year with the famine they were streets ahead of everyone.
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They predicted it, they pre-positioned stuff and they saved an awful lot of lives under very
difficult circumstances but the system stretched.
As a concluding comment on this, we are talking about Somalia, but right now Sudan risks
imploding with all the human consequences there and we have the Sahel that has suddenly
just erupted. So there is a real stretch that is beginning to occur and I think it affects many
countries but certainly the EU as a triage. There is a limited pot of money and suddenly
there are new sets of problems and those problems have to be addressed, not just in a
humanitarian and developmental way, but also there are security issues. The money that is
provided to the EU, for instance, for what is known as the Africa Peace Facility, which is
what finances AMISOM and the fighting there, is development money. Working on the
proposition that you do not have development without security, therefore let us get the
security done. There is a real stretch right now both in terms of personnel and on
resources.
Q234 The Chairman: Finally, just to tie up a few loose ends—I am aware of the time—I
have a factual question on co-ordination between the EU and the UNDP rule of law and
security programme. Does that co-ordinate well? I know Lord Jopling was keen to follow up
something you might have heard on the previous session that was around the firearms on
vessels now and why this is a UK issue in terms of legality. I do not know whether you have
any idea as to whether this is a common problem among other EU nations in the area. That
may not be an area you are aware of.
Lastly, coming back to Atalanta, I want to ask about the mission ending in 2014. This has
been rolled over several times before, but does the piracy industry out there have it as a red
letter date when that mission finishes. Do they think that we will put the investment in then,
or is there an assumption that it will just continue? I suppose having done a report recently
on the Afghan police mission, we just really had the impression that the mission there was
Alexander Rondos – Oral evidence (QQ176 – QQ234)
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going to have a huge problem just because everybody knew the military end date was at a
particular time. I do not know whether you feel that is reflected in this or not.
Alexander Rondos: Let me start on the last first. In one form or another there will be anti-
piracy operations that will go on so long as there are pirates around. I think it is as simple as
that. Whether it is the EU or whatever, that will continue.
Q235 The Chairman: Everybody knows that?
Alexander Rondos: Yes.
Q236 The Chairman: Fine, let us leave that at that.
Alexander Rondos: Secondly, on firearms on vessels, different countries seem to react very
differently. A lot of this requires legislation. In some countries there is the request that
actually formal armed forces are put on. In Germany, if I am right, this was raised recently by
some of the industry there. The German Government obviously objected so you have
different variants of the issue, but what is clear is that the presence of trained armed men on
the boats has proven quite a successful deterrent and so long as piracy is a threat in that
area, it is a practice that is encouraged.
EU, UNDP, on that particular programme that you mentioned, we think it is good and in fact
I would like to see it expanded. It is very effective and it is going to be key in Somalia.
Q237 The Chairman: As we said in the previous evidence session, this co-ordination of
work among member states, the EU and others is very important to us. Would you agree
with the comments from the previous witnesses—forgive me, it has just gone completely
out of my mind for some reason, but I think that they were from DFID—that this all works
well?
Alexander Rondos: Yes, let us be clear. People can become co-ordination fetishists and they
spend more time having coffees and meetings as opposed to getting the job done. So we
have to be quite serious, I think, here. What I do agree with is what Nick Kay was saying,
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and I feel very strongly on that. I do not call it co-ordination; we are actually involved in the
joint management of responsibilities here and it is on the ground. What is needed now is
more people in Mogadishu getting together there and dealing with a lot of hard operational
issues that require real close co-operation, synchronisation and whatever else. That is the
issue. Whether that is over politics or over how money is spent or how the stabilisation
programme is done, I think it is the people on the coalface who need to be encouraged just
to be doing much more together. The way we judge who should be involved in the co-
ordination is not simply because you exist; it is by what you do. It is as simple as that.
The Chairman: Mr Rondos, thank you very much indeed for joining us. We all look
forward to seeing you out in Mogadishu when we can come out there ourselves and enjoy
the vibrancy of the cityscape that is clearly there that you described so well. We wish you
every success. Thank you very much indeed for being a part of our session.
Alexander Rondos: You are welcome, any time. Thank you very much for having me.
Dr Lee Willett – Oral evidence (QQ19 – QQ63)
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Dr Lee Willett – Oral evidence (QQ19 – QQ63)
Evidence to be found under Anyimadu
Dr Lee Willett – Supplementary written evidence
Baroness Henig: My problem is about the level of co-ordination between the EU’s different
elements, the naval force Atalanta, the training mission in Somalia and EUCAP Nestor. In particular,
I want to ask how the EUCAP Nestor initiative is progressing and whether the timetables are going
to be reached in terms of making that effective.
The aim of EUCAP Nestor is to assist regional states, including Somalia, to develop a self-
sustainable capacity to enhance their own maritime security and governance. EUCAP Nestor
is run by civilians and supported by military input from EUNAVFOR/Operation ATALANTA.
It is a key part of the EU’s effort to develop a comprehensive approach to dealing with the
problem of Somali piracy, and in particular through working closely with a number of other
international organisations and agencies, including the United Nations Office on Drugs and
Crime (UNODC).
Launched in December 2011, EUCAP Nestor has an initial two-year mandate.20 Since 1
January 2012, the EU’s efforts in Nestor have been strengthened by the role of Alexander
Rondos, the EU’s Special Representative to the Horn of Africa.
The central element of EUCAP Nestor’s role is maritime security capacity building, looking
to build within the regional states an enduring ability to police and secure their own waters
and exclusive economic zones. EUCAP Nestor also focuses on training, information sharing
and the development of an effective judicial infrastructure. Other core elements of its role
are humanitarian aid and development co-operation.
The European Union argues that a key component of its ability to integrate effectively with
other organisations and agencies is the fact that it takes a bespoke approach for each
country and each case.21 The intent for Nestor is that it will work very closely with
20 See European Union, ‘EUCAP Nestor’. Available on-line at: http://consilium.europa.eu/eeas/security-defence/eu-
operations/eucap-nestor . Accessed 9 July 2012; Council of the European Union, ‘Fight against Piracy: Council Launches EU
Action to Strengthen Maritime Capacities in the Horn of Africa’. Press Release 18321/3/11 Rev 3. 12 December 2011.
Available on-line at: <http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_data/docs/pressdata/EN/foraff/126796.pdf>. Accessed 9
July 2012. 21 European Union. ‘EUCAP NESTOR: (Regional Maritime Capacity Building for the Horn of Africa and the Western Indian
Ocean)’. Available on-line at: http://consilium.europa.eu/media/1617222/factsheet__eucap_nestor_en_.pdf . Accessed 9 July
2012.
Dr Lee Willett – Supplementary written evidence
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ATALANTA’s naval forces, with the EU Training Mission in Somalia and with the EU’s
regional maritime security training centre in Djibouti.
When viewed in the context of EUNAVFOR’s own mandate extension, in terms of
expanding its area of operations to include activities ashore, the establishment of a bespoke
organisation in Nestor to focus specifically on maritime security capacity-building can be
seen as part of a broader effort by the EU to increase the pressure on the pirates while also
enabling the Somali governments and peoples to take greater responsibility for their own
security. It may be too early to tell just how effective Nestor’s efforts to maximise the
synergy of its influence through multi-agency integration will be. However, Nestor’s
establishment fits neatly with the wider strategic message of a dual-track EU approach –
solving the problem at sea while also enabling the improvement of security ashore. Nestor –
with its focus on maritime security capacity-building, training, information-sharing and
building effective governance through the role of law – is able to contribute to both tracks of
this policy. Thus, it is part of the EU’s effort to communicate and demonstrate its strategic
commitment to this issue.
July 2012