Clarion Content

The pirates are back at it again. If they ever left that is.

If you have been reading the subsections, you know the Clarion loves to keep abreast of the pirates. As does our source, Rantburg, and the Economist. We saw this week where the Christian Science Monitor says that piracy helps fund many parties in the on-going warlordism of the failed state of Somalia.

The Christian Science Monitor, citing a Kenyan maritime expert, said that this week saw a 48 hour stretch that was the busiest ever for Somali pirates. This is one of the world's hottest spots for piracy . The CSM cites Andrew Mwangura, of the Seafarers' Assistance Program, who analyzes piracy Kenya's port city of Mombasa. He says that piracy money flows into all kinds of coffers, "The pirates are earning millions of dollars. A lot of that is invested in businesses in the United Arab Emirates and Kenya, but a lot is also funding the fighters on both sides – government officials, warlords, and Islamists are all getting their share."

The Clarion is curious to know by whose definition other than the externally imposed are these brigands even Somali? This piracy is about a failed state and a failed economy. In a situation with no work, piracy and kidnapping for ransom might appear an attractive option for the chronically unemployed and impoverished. Per capita income in Somalia is estimated at $600 per year. It sounds quite plausible that the pirates who take the ships are pawns in a much larger game. How does an unemployed Somali with an AK-47 sharing a speedboat with twenty fellows armed with their own AK-47s, and perhaps grenades, dispose of a couple of million dollars in ransom money? At the ATM?

The Monitor clearly makes the connection between the externally constructed state's failure, violence on land, absence of the rule of law and piracy. On that note the Clarion noticed another act of piracy this week near another impoverished, but not as yet failed state, Bangladesh.

It is worth noting, too, that the linked Economist article makes the connection between extreme poverty and piracy.

Labels: Economy, Middle East