EU sends eyes in the sky against pirates

MOGADISHU, Somalia, July 27 (UPI) -- As the U.S. Navy warns of an expected surge in pirate attacks off Somalia as the monsoon season comes to an end, the European Union has unveiled plans to extend aerial surveillance by its naval task force 1,000 miles southward into the Indian Ocean.

The EU anti-piracy force's commander, Rear Adm. Peter Hudson, said on July 23 that three aircraft currently based at Djibouti, a former French colony on the Horn of Africa, will be rotated to Mombasa, the main port of Kenya in East Africa.

"What we really need are eyes in the south," Hudson said.

The task force's air wing currently consists of a French Falcon 50, a corporate jet equipped with surveillance systems; and two PC-3 Orion maritime patrol aircraft used by France and Spain for counter-piracy operations.

The United States and Japan also have PC-3s deployed in Djibouti at the U.S. counter-terrorism base at a former French Foreign legion camp. The Americans also employ unmanned drones to monitor maritime traffic and potential pirate activity.

The move southward by EU forces will expand the monitored zone by several hundred square miles and allow the task force's 30 ships to increase their observation of Somali waters from both the north and south.

The surveillance of the western Indian Ocean is vital because monitoring this vast expanse of water is far more difficult than the coastal waters off Somalia.

The expanded deployment has become necessary because in recent months the pirates have gone further afield as patrol activity in the shipping lanes in the Gulf of Aden on which they preyed has intensified.

Commercial vessels have been attacked in the Gulf of Oman, west of the initial piracy zone, and even hundreds of miles off the Kenyan coast.

The aircraft will allow commanders to utilize their limited assets in the region more effectively.

But more aircraft will be needed if the expanded zone of naval operations is to produce results, particularly in the weeks ahead when the monsoon storms die out and weather conditions once more favor the pirates.

The EU deployment is the bloc's first ever naval operation and now includes warships from India, Japan, China and Russia.

According to Vice Adm. Oleg Burtsev, first deputy chief of the Russian Navy General Staff: "Pirates have become more daring and aggressive. There were instances when they seized vessels right in front of the ships that were responsible for the security of commercial shipping."

Burtsev, speaking in Moscow on July 20 as Russia dispatched a new flotilla to the Gulf of Aden to relieve the one currently there, estimated that there were at least five large groups of pirates, totaling some 5,000 men, operating off Somalia.

The Russians have noted that because most of the 16 nations participating in the anti-piracy operations do not allow their forces to prosecute pirates, largely because of the absence of any clear-cut legal jurisdiction, the pirates have become more brazen.

Some governments do not even allow their warships to open fire on pirates.

These obstacles, according to Western officials, mean that while the number of merchant ships actually seized by the pirates has fallen, the number of actual attacks has increased.

The Russians appear to be seeking to amend the rules of engagement. Their new flotilla not only includes a detachment of naval infantry, but a team of lawyers and criminal investigators as well -- the better, presumably, to prosecute any captured pirates.

Several suspects have recently been put on trial in Kenya for the first time, and the Nairobi government's agreement to provide a base to intensify the anti-piracy campaign indicates that it is also prepared to provide a legal framework to combat the sea bandits.

That may be not a moment too soon. The London-based International Maritime Bureau reported on July 16 that the number of pirate attacks more than doubled in the first half of this year compared with the same period in 2008.

Most of the 240 incidents occurred in the Gulf of Aden, compared with 114 in the equivalent period in 2008.

As of mid-July, 78 vessels had been boarded and 31 of them hijacked, with six crewmen killed, 19 wounded and 561 taken captive for varying lengths of time.

According to the United Nations, the pirates collected $150 million in ransom from shipowners in 2008.

Overall losses from piracy were estimated at $13 billion to $16 billion because of soaring insurance and ship-protections costs as well as having to send ships on longer routes to avoid the high-risk zones.