Currently, some “pirates” from Somalia are on trial in Germany. They are accused of having attacked the 140 metre long „Taipan“ from the Hamburg shipping company Komrowski on Easter Monday, April, 5th, on its way from Haifa to Mombasa around 500 sea miles before the Somalian coast. A special unit of the frigate „Tromp“ out of the Netherlands took the pirates captive on board, securing five machine guns, two rocket launchers including ammunition and two grapnels.
Here is what “focus” wrote in an article:
It is the first pirate trial in centuries in Hamburg and people have been extremely expectant. 20 lawyers represent the ten accused persons
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The Somalian citizens must answer for attack on oceanic traffic and extortionate kidnapping at the County Court of the hanseatic city.
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Among the accused are seven adults, two adolescents and one youth. The oldest of them was born in 1962, the youngest around 1993.
One of the accused could give no other details when asked his time of birth than:
Born in the rainy season under a tree …
Early this December, parliament renewed the mandate for the “Bundeswehr” before Somalia (along with two other mandates: for the “Althea” deployment in Bosnia and the NATO deployment “Operation Active Endeavour” as part of the anti terror activities “Operation Enduring Freedom” in the Mediterranean).
Does this all make sense?
The 10 persons from Somalia were recruited with the promise of a premium considerably higher than their entire life’s income would have been. Now they are facing trial and have 20 lawyers to assist them at their defence. Each of the lawyers probably earns more in a single day than the pirates in several years. If they are found guilty, the pirates will have to spend 15 years in jail. It is, however, doubtful if they will actually end up in a German jail. Basically, it would not even make sense.
The more countries get impoverished, the higher the risk of attacks on the trade routes. Now, the attacks are against oil tankers, soon they might be directed against food shipments. And the more injustice disunites nations and people, the more the poor people will be prepared to take risks in order to escape their misery. To them, the means to the end do not make a difference. It might be “illegal” migration or “criminal” activities. And the use of the army by the rich nations in order to protect merchant and oceanic routes will increase proportionally.
Saudi Arabia, for example, bought arable land in Pakistan in order to guarantee its own supply with food. There is a trail on which the goods are then transported to the harbour. They already try to find ways how to protect the transports against hungry highwaymen.
One way or other, it all does not make sense to me. We really should drastically change our social and political way of thinking.
RMD
(Translated by EG)
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