ARMED guards aboard ships in pirate infested waters off the Horn of Africa, will not substitute for naval protection, according to the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF), reports London’s Tanker Operator.
“Until more countries are prepared to patrol, arrest and prosecute, and to take the fight to the pirates and their bases – which are often fuel dumps and facilities in plain view right on the beaches – the world will continue to be held to ransom, and innocent seafarers to risk imprisonment, torture and, ultimately, death,” said the ITF’s seafarers chairman Dave Heindel.
“What’s an open secret is the yawning gap in flag state responsibility. While some nations and their armed forces are doing an amazing job, others are shirking their responsibilities,” said Mr Heindel.
Said ITF general secretary David Cockroft: “Somali-based piracy has been allowed to become so successful, savage and wide-ranging that seafarers’ and seafaring organisations’ worries about armed guards have had to be set aside. However, guards can never be anything but a supplement to the sorely-tried existing naval presence, which is now trying to cover an entire ocean.”
Mr Cockroft said he agreed with the International Shipping Federation and International Chamber of Shipping, that having on-vessel detachments made up of the ship’s flag state forces was the best practice to be followed.
Under the British plan, the Home Secretary (security minister) will be given the power to license vessels to carry armed security, armed with machine guns, currently prohibited under UK firearms law.
Source : Sea News