Somali piracy 2.0 – BBC meets the new pirates of the high seas

Two Somali fishermen wore large scarves over their heads to hide their faces and stared around as they entered the room for a secret meeting and told me that they had recently paid millions of dollars in ransom. Why have you decided to become a gun-wielding pirate?

“You are free to record – we accept,” one told me as they sat nervously for the interview, which took months to set up in the small coastal town of Eel.

This behavior contrasts sharply with the bravery of the pirates who initially roamed this charming, ancient port nestled among the arid mountains on Somalia’s Indian Ocean coast.

It has always been considered strategic, not only because of its location but also because it has a source of fresh water – and pirates made it their base during the piracy boom of the early to mid-2000s.

It became known as “Harunta Burkada” – the pirate capital. From here, they target container ships transporting goods around the world and even some oil tankers, forcing shipping companies to alter their routes.

Regional authorities had no influence – and even the local police force was afraid to enter the city.

Pirates kept their hijacked ships anchored offshore and businesses in the town and area profited from ransom payments. The World Bank estimates that pirate groups earned between $339m (£267m) and $413m between 2005 and 2012.

But when international navies started patrolling Somalia’s waters and these days the Puntland Maritime Police Force has its base in Eel, the pirates’ fortunes changed.

Most of the town welcomed this as the pirates brought with them shocking inflation, drugs, alcohol and a bad reputation that the local Muslim elders shunned.

But in this city full of fishermen, which depends on the sea for its survival, the long-felt resentment towards foreign shipping, especially fishing trawlers, has never gone away. To this day they accuse these fishing boats of stealing their livelihood – often violently.

“The ships came and took all our equipment and stuff,” Farah, one of the fisherman-turned-pirates who was watching defensively from behind his blue scarf, tells the BBC.

Both her name and that of her friend Diriye, wrapped in a white headscarf, have been changed – one of the conditions of our meeting.

He and a few others had invested about $10,000 for a boat, outboard engine and nets in the fishing venture. But Farah says that last year the crew of a foreign trawler came and stole the net, including its catch, and then destroyed it by shooting out the engine.

The pair give another example: Some of their relatives went out one morning to check their nets and never returned – fishermen usually go out in the morning and return before the afternoon heat sets in.

Three days later they were found swimming towards the beach.

“There were bullets in his body,” says Diriye.

“They did not have guns; they went to sea with nets to earn their livelihood.”

Farah adds, “We work and live by the sea. The sea is our business.

“When someone threatens and robs you, it is inevitable to fight. They caused the fight. If they had not taken our property, we would not have stolen.”

These people – all aged over 30 – are not alone in deciding to turn to theft in the last year.

According to the EU naval force Operation Atalanta, which patrols nearby, there were 26 pirate attacks between 2013 and 2019 – and then none from 2020 to 2022. But they resumed in 2023, with six attacks and increased to 22 this year, the data through December 5 shows.

Most of these skirmishes do not end in a successful kidnapping – but when they do, it pays off. Pirates say they received $5 million ransom To release the hijacked Bangladesh-flagged MV Abdullah in March 2024. The ship’s owner has not confirmed this, but said it was freed after negotiations.

in sources Semi-autonomous Puntland state, where Eel is located, told the BBC they estimated there were about 10 gangs operating in the region, each with about 12 members.

They go to sea for 15 to 30 days at a time, packing AK-47s, rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), food and fuel into their small speed-boats.

Farah and Diriye say that their objective is to hijack a medium-sized ship deep in the Indian Ocean and then bring it back to its original ship, using its GPS tracking system to find larger ships to target.

“You can attack ships using small speed boats,” says Farah.

His Bazooka rocket launcher is also an essential part of his strategy.

“We use RPGs to stop the ship. When the ship doesn’t stop, we shoot at it. We don’t kill. The objective is to get something, not to kill. (The objective is) to scare them, ” says Diriye.

All these weapons don’t come cheap – so the gangs inevitably seek funding from willing investors. Dissatisfied fishermen expressed sentiments and a syndicate was formed often consisting of various businessmen from the towns of Garowe and Bosaso.

One might finance boats, another for weapons and a third for miscellaneous items like fuel. These entrepreneurs sometimes invest in several groups in the hope that one of them will hit the jackpot if the ship is captured so that they can receive a share of the ransom.

And guns are easy to get hold of in Somalia – even in Eel you can pick up an AK-47 for about $1,200, a legacy of its two-decade civil war and years of chaos.

Farah and Diriye say they were not involved in the piracy boomtime and have not taken any advice from retired pirates, some of whom also started out as disgruntled fishermen.

Most of these former pirates have left the area – often having gone abroad or repented.

In one famous case a former pirate – Abdirahman Bakele – donated his property. In 2020, he donated the houses and hotels he bought in Garowe to Muslim charities and is now a traveling evangelist, going from town to town in Puntland and urging people to live a modest and morally upright life. Are requesting.

Adado, a town in central Somalia where pirates once invested, received the nickname “Blue City” because their newly built mansions often had blue-painted iron sheet roofs.

Most of these homes now sit vacant – or available for rent for as little as $100 a month.

In Ele, town elders say the main legacy of piracy is the prevalence of alcohol, often smuggled in from Ethiopia, and drugs such as opioids – with concerns that some young people who already chew the stimulant leaf khat , which is a popular afternoon pastime. Becoming a drug addict.

Those who gather outside tea shops in the afternoon to play dominoes and discuss the news say they do not approve of piracy – although they understand the hostility toward foreign ships.

The recent shooting of three fishermen clearly distresses many people.

Ali Mursal Muze, who has been fishing for eels, lobsters and sharks for nearly 40 years to support his wife and 12 children, believes he may have been mistaken for a pirate – as It happened years ago.

He recalls, “We left here with another fishing boat and went out to sea. At the same time pirates tried to hijack a ship. A plane came by. My boat came to the shore; the other “A fishing boat was attacked.”

Forty-year-old widow Hawa Mohammed Zuberi believes her husband faced a similar fate when he went missing 14 years ago.

This was when piracy was at its peak and she had recently given birth to a son, whom they wanted to circumcise.

“My husband was thinking if they caught the shark we could pay to have the baby circumcised,” she tells the BBC, clearly still distressed by their deaths. She says that she faces difficulty in paying her children’s school fees by making a living by selling samosas.

Mr Muse says the main issue for him these days is the unethical behavior of fishing fleets from countries like Iran and Yemen who often steal his equipment.

They believe they have been issued fake Somali fishing licenses by powerful local supporters who also provide them with gunmen for protection. They accused them of plundering their catches and intruding on their fishing grounds.

“They have an area where they work and they also come to the beach. When we go and ask for our equipment back, they shoot at us. Recently, they have hurt some people “They shot a boy, injuring his arm and leg.”

The fisherman says that he has complained to the local authorities several times, but nothing was ever done.

Puntland’s Information Minister Kaydid Dirir acknowledges the presence of some illegal vessels and says that some foreign vessels may be licensed and “abuse” them.

“Illegal fishing is rampant in all seas and piracy can happen anywhere. Progress is being made slowly,” he told the BBC.

Illegal fishing in Somalia has been a controversial issue for many years.

According to the Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime, many fishing boats operate without a license or without a license issued by bodies with the authority to do so.

It cites evidence, including satellite navigation data, that shows many of the ships come from China, Iran, Yemen and south-east Asia. A report by the US Embassy in Mogadishu shows that Somalia loses $300 million every year as a result.

Rear Admiral Manuel Alvargonzalez Méndez of Operation Atalanta says his forces only target pirate ships and now have to protect the ships as well Yemen’s Houthi rebels,

But he says the area is safer and Somalis can now “cast their fishing nets without fear” – as does the Puntland maritime police force, which works closely with the EU naval mission.

Its commander Farhan Awil Hashi is confident that it will not return to the “bad old days” of piracy.

He believes the long-term answer is “job creation”.

“Young people should always have a job,” he told the BBC. “If a person is busy with something, he won’t think of going out to sea and hijacking ships.”

Farah and Diriye make the same argument – ​​they say because fishing no longer makes any money, hijacking a ship for ransom is the only way they can support their children.

They know stealing is wrong – and Diriye admits he is too afraid to tell his mother.

“If she had known, she would have been very upset. In fact, she would have informed the authorities.”