Piracy attacks off the Horn of Africa and in Southeast Asia have attracted most attention but the Gulf of Guinea has emerged as a new “hot spot”. Increased assaults are threatening the economic development of the region, particularly the exploitation of its marine resources, according to a maritime security expert.
The menacing dimensions of such attacks are underlined by the fact that the Gulf of Guinea adjoins the shores of West and Central Africa between Guinea Bissau and Angola. Eminent countries in the region include Ghana, Liberia and Nigeria. Large quantities of oil, fish and other marine resources make the region a potentially rich economic zone, which produces more than 5 million barrels of oil each day and more than three quarters of the world’s supply of cocoa.
The Gulf of Guinea region, along with the Congo River delta and Angola further south, are in fact expected to provide around a quarter of the United States’ oil imports by 2015. The region is regarded as one of the world’s top oil and gas exploration hot spots.
However, as Sam Bateman points out, “the region has more than its fair share of problems, including civil unrest, political instability, border disputes, corruption and poor governance.” An increasing number of acts of piracy are posing another problem, which calls for regional cooperation and international assistance to address it effectively, says Bateman, a former Australian naval commodore with research interests in piracy and maritime terrorism, in a commentary for the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.
According to the International Maritime Bureau (IMB), 52 actual and attempted piracy attacks were reported around the Gulf of Guinea during 2011, as opposed to 39 in 2010. 19 attacks occurred in the first quarter of 2012. The 52 attacks in 2011 represent about 12 percent of the total attacks around the world during the year. Along with the Horn of Africa with 239 attacks during the year and Southeast Asia with 101, these three areas account for nearly 90 per cent of global piracy.
Analyzing the IMB figures, Bateman says: While most attacks have occurred off Nigeria, more attacks occurred in 2011 in the waters off Benin with 20 attacks during the year as compared with only one in the previous four years. The situation off Nigeria improved during 2011 with 10 attacks that year compared with 19 in 2010.
The first quarter of 2012 saw a resurgence of two attacks off Nigeria, but there was some improvement off Benin, partly due to joint naval patrols by Nigeria and Benin. Some attacks off Benin and Nigeria involve a ship being hijacked and a significant part of its cargo stolen — losses from each attack range from $ 2 million to $ 6 million.
“These attacks suggest considerable planning, organization and sophisticated modes of operation by the pirates,” says Bateman, adding: “Most attacks occur at night and target oil and chemical tankers that are stationary while conducting ship-to-ship transfer operations, often at a distance of over 40 nautical miles offshore.”
— This article appeared in InDepthNews
In a recent incident, the 76,600 dwt product tanker BW RHINE under the Panama flag was seized from an anchorage off Togo on April 28, 2012. The vessel was released a few days later after some of its cargo of gasoline had been stolen. According to the IMB, at least 16 similar incidents have been reported along the coastline from Togo to Nigeria over the past year.
“Piracy in the Gulf of Guinea has its origins in political instability, corruption and the economic problems of the region,” writes Bateman, adviser to the RSIS’s Maritime Security Program. “Oil and gas developments, particularly offshore in the Gulf of Guinea, provide attractive targets. Attacks in Nigeria in the 1990s were often perpetrated by groups such as the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) which attacked pipelines and offshore platforms,” he adds.
According to estimates, piracy currently results in an annual loss of about $ 2 billion to the economy of the West African sub-region. Nigeria is believed to lose about 7 per cent of its oil revenues to criminal activities. A large and highly developed black market for oil and its products exists in the region.
Piracy in the region also affects the operation of vessels associated with the exploration and exploitation of offshore oil and gas, such as seismic research vessels and offshore supply vessels. Seismic survey vessels are low and slow and thus vulnerable to ‘hit and run’ attacks to steal valuables or even kidnap crewmembers.
— This article appeared in InDepthNews.
Piracy acquires a new dimension
