We cover piracy, armed robbery at sea, IUU fishing, maritime cyber security and maritime security issues.
Security Agencies in Ghana and their counterparts in Togo, Benin and Nigeria have intensified investigations to rescue two South Korean nationals who were kidnapped in Ghanaian waters by pirates.
The victims, a captain and first engineer of the fishing vessel AP703, were kidnapped on the high seas of Ghana on August 28, 2020.
However, 49 other Ghanaian crew members were left after their properties were seized by the pirates.
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Source: modernghana.com
All Coast Guard stations and sub-stations in Metro Manila, Central Luzon, and Southern Tagalog districts were directed Thursday to intensify their watch over robbery incidents as an increase in robberies in the areas were recently reported.
Admiral George Ursabia, Jr., Philippine Coast Guard commandant, has ordered the district stations “to intensify intelligence gathering and maritime patrol operations in the vicinity waters of Manila Bay and Southern Luzon to prevent or deter the occurrence of said incidents.”
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Source: mb.com.ph
Despite the coronavirus pandemic, piracy and other crimes have surged in Asian waters in the first seven months of the year, many committed by a Philippines-based Islamist group linked to Islamic State, according to a report released on Wednesday.
Especially hard hit have been the Sulu Sea and coastal areas of the southern Philippines, said the report by Babel Street, an open source data analysis company based in Virginia.
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Source: hellenicshippingnews.com
Chaos at sea: Pirates are said to have hijacked the tanker “Aegean II” in the Gulf of Aden, the shipping service “G-Captain” reported at the end of August. Two days later it was reported that men in police uniforms had boarded the “Aegean II”. They took the weapons from the private security forces on board the ship and demanded money from the 20-member ship crew. As a Spanish military ship approached, they disappeared as quickly as they had come. It is still unclear whether the perpetrators were pirates – or even Somali policemen.
It is not only in eastern Africa that the security situation for international merchant shipping is critical. In its “Piracy Report”, the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) reported 162 pirate attacks worldwide and 130 hijacked ships last year. This represents a 20 percent decrease compared to 2018. But in some areas the situation is different, where the danger increases significantly.
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Source: welt.de
Justice. I. Sani of the Federal High Court sitting in Port Harcourt has convicted the duo of Eimiuhi Gabriel and Godwin Ossai and their company, Ehikioya Associates Nigeria Limited, for operating a vessel, MT Madam Esther in Nigerian territorial waters without due licence and registration from the appropriate authority.
The trio was arraigned on a one-count charge each by the Benin Zonal office of the Economic and Financial Crimes, EFCC. They pleaded guilty to the charge when it was read to them.
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Source: channelstv.com
Press Release
THE Combined Maritime Forces (CMF) and EUNAVFOR have held discussions about developing their partnership in conducting counter-piracy operations in the region.
CMF’s Combined Task Force 151, an anti-piracy task force led by the Turkish Navy, held discussions with Commander of EUNAVFOR’s CTF 465, Rear Admiral Riccardo Marchiò via a video teleconference.
CTF 151 Commander, Rear Admiral Inanir said: “It is important that we continue discussions with our partners, especially in this crucial part of the world.”
“Today we talked about planning joint exercises, focused operations and information sharing. We need to ensure that there are no gaps in our routine patrols, so that we are both able to respond to incidents effectively,” RADM Inanir added.
Whilst the CTF 151 staff conducted the call from the CMF headquarters in Bahrain, RADM Marchiò was operating from the Italian frigate, Luigi Rizzo, as his task force commence counter piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden.
CMF’s CTF 151 and EUNAVFOR’s CTF 465 both operate in a contentious region which is home to a number of the world’s most strategic chokepoints, and piracy and armed robbery at sea remain a threat to merchant shipping in the region.
Both commanders agree that the size of the area is a challenge that can only overcome by effective cooperation, demonstrating the importance of the partnership shared by CMF and EUNAVFOR.
“There are many merits to coordinating exercises and military campaigns together; warships are able to operate efficiently together,” said RADM Riccardo Marchiò.
“The south west monsoon season continues in the region, with associated blustery weather and a high sea state. As the weather eases, it becomes more feasible for pirates to operate again,” said RADM Inanir, concluding the call. “CTF 151 and CTF 465 must be ready and alert to prevent them.”
Maritime security intelligence agencies have reported that the Water Phoenix reefer vessel was boarded Tuesday morning off Nigeria by an unknown number of persons and that two Russian nationals have been kidnapped.
Per Praesidium International, a risk consultancy and maritime security company, the incident happened at 5:50 a.m. UTC Tuesday, approximately 34 nautical miles south of Lagos.
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Source: marinelink.com
MarsecNews: The initial report from MDAT-GoG is as follows:
1. CATEGORY: BOARDING.
2. TIME: 08 Sep 2020 0550UTC.
3. DESCRIPTION: A MV was attacked by an unknown amount of persons. No additional information.
4. POSITION: 05°53N 003°17E (33 Nm southwest of Lagos).
By: Salifa Karapetyan Edited by: Betymie Bonnelame
(Seychelles News Agency) – Four witnesses from the Seychelles Police Force presented their evidence Monday as the trial of five Somali nationals suspected of a pirate attack against a Korean fishing vessel began at the Supreme Court.
According to the EU NAVFOR, the incident began on April 19, 2019 when five suspected pirates captured a Yemeni dhow off the coast of Somalia. Two days later the pirates attacked the Korean fishing vessel Adria with the dhow acting as a mothership in the Indian Ocean some 280 nautical miles off the coast of Somalia.
On April 23, the EU NAVFOR‘s flagship ESPS NAVARRA intercepted and boarded the captured dhow vessel and apprehended the five suspected pirates. The forces said that it was the first notable piracy incident event since October 2018, a huge drop in frequency compared to a decade earlier when Somali piracy interrupted international shipping and travel on a major scale.
The prosecutor in the case, Georges Thachett, told SNA that “we have a fair amount of evidence but it is up to the court to decide the outcome.”
The lawyer representing the Somalis, Joel Camille, told SNA that the local witnesses are expected to be heard until Thursday when witnesses overseas would connect via video link. Only then, Camile said, would he know how the case for his clients was going.
According to the Department of Foreign Affairs, the EU NAVFOR Somalia Operation Atalanta transferred the five suspects to Seychellois authorities last year in accordance with a transfer agreement between the Seychelles and the European Union with support from United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).
Present at the hearing was a representative of the UNODC whose duty is to look after the welfare of the accused and ensure that there is a fair legal process.
Camille said the case was supposed to start last Monday but the prosecution were unable to bring in their witnesses.
“The court gave them until last Friday when they advised the court that they will start their case today,” he added.
Seychelles is east of the Somali coast and has placed itself at the forefront of the fight against piracy since 2005 when the scourge began expanding, adversely impacting the nation’s tourism and fishing industries, the top pillars of its economy. The island nation in the western Indian Ocean has since then been working with international partners to apprehend and prosecute suspected Somali pirates.
Somaliland and Seychelles signed a Memorandum of Understanding on the transfer of sentenced pirates in 2011. With special jurisdiction to handle piracy and maritime crime cases, Seychelles started hearing cases in June 2015.
Source: seychellesnewsagency.com
In a year of unabated insecurity in the Gulf of Guinea, one of the most welcomed maritime security-oriented acts of 2019 was Nigeria’s establishment of its Deep Blue Project. The Integrated National Security and Waterways Protection Infrastructure, otherwise known as the Deep Blue Project (DBP), aims to comprehensively address insecurity and criminality in Nigeria’s territorial waters and exclusive economic zone. The means of the DBP involve the acquisition of assets, (e.g., unmanned aerial vehicles and fast intervention vessels), development of infrastructure (e.g., new command and control centers), interagency information-sharing, and enhanced training of security services, among other things. According to the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), between August 2019 and June 2020, 80 percent of the necessary assets had been delivered and the Command, Control, Computer Communication, and Information Centre (C4i) was officially launched at NIMASA’s base in Kirikiri, Lagos.
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Source: stableseas.org
South Africa is ready to help insurgency-hit Mozambique with support from its intelligence services or military, but its neighbour would first need to request that help, South African foreign minister Naledi Pandor said on Wednesday.
Pandor told a parliamentary committee that the Southern African Development Community (SADC) had asked Mozambique to provide a roadmap on the assistance it might need, which would then be deliberated upon before a course of action was chosen.
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Source: defenceweb.co.za
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