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II. PIRACY OFF SOMALIA: UN SECURITY COUNCIL RESOLUTION 1816 AND IMO REGIONAL COUNTER-PIRACY EFFORTS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 August 2008

Douglas Guilfoyle
Douglas Guilfoyle
Affiliation:
Lecturer, University College London. Email: d.guilfoyle@ucl.ac.uk.
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Type
Current Developments: Public International Law
Information
International & Comparative Law Quarterly , Volume 57 , Issue 3 , July 2008 , pp. 690 - 699
Copyright
Copyright © 2008 British Institute of International and Comparative Law

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References

1 ‘Cruise lines turn to sonic weapon’, BBC News, 8 November 2005, http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/africa/4418748.stm; ‘Somalia: Pirates attack UN aid ship, prompting call for action’, UN News Centre, 20 May 2007, http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=22609&Cr=Somalia&Cr1=; ‘French troops seize Somali pirates after hostages are freed’, International Herald Tribune, 11 April 2008, <http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/04/11/africa/yacht.php>.

2 See International Maritime Organisation Reports on Acts of Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships: IMO Doc. MSC.4/Circ.81 (Annual Report 2005); and MSC.4/Circ.105, MSC.4/Circ.106, MSC.4/Circ.110, MSC.4/Circ.114 (Quarterly Reports 2007). The Malacca Strait has seen a notable decline in attacks against shipping in recent years, as discussed below.

3 Report of the Monitoring Group on Somalia pursuant to Security Council Resolution 1724 (2006), UN Doc. S/2007/436 (18 July 2007) [‘Somalia Monitoring Group Report’], para 90.

4 ‘Call to arms to tackle Somalia piracy threat; International shipping community must act to end violent attacks’, Lloyd's List, 16 January 2008, p.15. The International Maritime Bureau is a commercial shipping organisation not be confused with the UN specialised agency, the International Maritime Organisation.

5 D Nizza, ‘Intensifying the Hunt Against Somali Pirates’, New York Times Online, 29 November 2007, <http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/11/29/intensifying-the-hunt-against-somali-pirates/>, quoting A Mwangura, East Africa Seafarers' Assistance Program.

6 ibid.

7 ‘Somalia: Pirates attack UN aid ship, prompting call for action’, UN News Centre, 20 May 2007, <http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=22609&Cr=Somalia&Cr1=>; ‘Aid vessel hijacked off Somalia’, BBC News, 18 May 2008, <http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/africa/7406818.stm>.

8 ‘Fishing for the motives that lie behind piracy; Attacks on vessels can often be attributed to social deprivation in coastal regions’, Lloyd's List, 5 March 2008, 19. One can also find occasional assertions that Somali pirates are defending coastal waters from the illegal dumping of toxic waste.

9 ibid.

10 ‘French troops seize Somali pirates’ (n 1); ‘France charges Somali pirates’, BBC News, 18 April 2008, <http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7355598.stm>; on France's cooperation with the the TFG in the Ponant affair, see also: International Maritime Organisation, ‘France and IMO agree on prevention and suppression of piracy and armed robbery’, IMO Media Briefing 14, 15 April 2008, <http://www.imo.org>.

11 Art 15, Geneva Convention on the High Seas 1958, 450 UNTS 82; Art 101, United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea 1982, 1833 UNTS 3 [hereinafter, ‘UNCLOS’].

12 I Brownlie, Principles of Public International Law (6th edn, OUP, Oxford, 2003) 229; D Momtaz, ‘The High Sea’ in R-J Dupuy and D Vignes (eds), A Handbook on the New Law of the Sea (Dordrecht, Nijhoff, 1991) vol 1, 417. The strongest dissent is found in A Rubin, The Law of Piracy (Newport, Rhode Island, Naval War College Press, 1988).

13 Art 110, UNCLOS.

14 Art 105, UNCLOS. The use of ‘may seize’ and ‘may decide upon … penalties’ reflects the fact that not all States have, historically, enacted legislation to authorise suppression and punishment of piracy: Joseph W. Bingham (reporter), Harvard Research in International Law: Draft Convention on Piracy, AJIL Sup 26 (1932), 755–756, 760 [hereinafter, Harvard Draft Convention and Commentary].

15 US Navy News, ‘Suspected Pirates Captured Off Somali Coast’, 21 January 2006 <http://www.news.navy.mil/search/display.asp?story_id=22026>; BBC News, ‘Jail sentence for Somali pirates’, 1 November 2006 <http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/africa/6105262.stm>.

16 A more detailed treatment of arguments involved will be given in D Guilfoyle, Shipping Interdiction and the Law of the Sea (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, forthcoming 2009).

17 See: Harvard Draft Convention and Commentary, 798 ff and 857 ff; R Jennings and A Watts (eds), Oppenheim's International Law: Volume I, Peace (9th edn, Longman, Harlow, 1992) 748 ff.

18 Castle John v NV Mabeco (Belgium, Court of Cassation, 1986) 77 ILR 537.

19 See, for example, Art 2, Code of Practice for the Investigation of the Crimes of Piracy and Armed Robbery Against Ships, annexed to IMO Doc A 22/Res.922 (22 January 2002).

20 Art 111, UNCLOS.

21 Note early proposals for a limited right to pursue pirates into territorial waters in: Harvard Draft Convention and Commentary, 744 and 833.

22 IMO Doc A 25/Res 1002 (6 December 2007), para 6; replacing IMO Doc A 24/Res 979 (6 February 2006) which did not call for such action.

23 UNSCR 1676 (2006); UNSCR 1772 (2007); UNSCR 1801 (2008).

24 UNSCR 1772 (2007), para 18; UNSCR 1801 (2008), para 12.

25 UNSCR 1801 (2008), para 12. The Netherlands has now taken on this role.

26 ‘UN urged to tackle Somali pirates’, BBC News, 28 April 2008, <http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/europe/7372390.stm>; the Resolution was ultimately sponsored by Australia, Canada, Denmark, Greece, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Norway, Republic of Korea, Spain, and the United Kingdom.

27 Paras 2, 3 and 5, UNSCR 1816 (2008).

28 See R McLaughlin, ‘United Nations Mandated Naval Interdiction Operations in the Territorial Sea?’ (2002) 51 ICLQ 249.

29 See n 10 above.

30 See: Guyana v Suriname (2008) 47 ILM 166, 231; and MV Saiga (No 2) (1999) 38 ILM 1323, 1355 discussing The I'm Alone (1935) 29 AJIL 326 and Red Crusader (1962) 35 ILR 485 and Article 22(1)(f), United Nations Agreement for the Implementation of the Provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of 10 December 1982 relating to the Conservation and Management of Straddling Fish Stocks and Highly Migratory Fish Stocks 1995, 2167 UNTS 88.

31 Paras 3 and 11, UNSCR 1816 (2008).

32 The reference to coastal States is odd. The only coastal State that could be involved by virtue of jurisdiction over the territorial sea is Somalia, unless a crime was commenced in an adjacent territorial sea and continued or completed in waters ‘off the coast of Somalia’. The jurisdictional claims of port States is also not immediately apparent, although the US State of Florida asserts jurisdiction over crimes at sea in certain cases based on its being the port of departure and it may be that similar laws exist elsewhere: see Florida Statute 910.006, ‘State Special Maritime Criminal Jurisdiction’.

33 The ostensible Art 27, UNCLOS prohibition upon exercising law-enforcement jurisdiction over vessels passing through the territorial sea in respect of crimes committed on the high seas would not apply here as the fleeing vessel would either be making for port (and thus not ‘passing though’) or could otherwise be considered as not engaged in innocent passage.

34 See the ‘Security Council Condemns Acts Of Piracy, Armed Robbery Off Somalia's Coast’, United Nations Department of Public Information Press Release of 2 June 2008 (http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2008/sc9344.doc.htm) (emphasis added).

35 ibid.

36 Previously, in 2005 the members of the African Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) resolved ‘to coordinate their strategies and action plans to face this common challenge in close collaboration with the international community’: Communiqué of the IGAD Council of Ministers' meeting in Jawhar on 29 November 2005, para 4, <http://www.geeskaafrika.com/igad2020_30nov05.htm>. The extent to which this translated into action, however, is unclear.

37 (2005) 44 ILM 829.

38 IMO Secretariat, Report: Sub-regional Meeting on Piracy and Armed Robbery Against Ships in the Western Indian Ocean, Gulf of Aden and Red Sea Area, 14 to 18 April 2008, TC 0153-08-2000 [IMO Sub-Regional Meeting Report] (copy on file with author).

39 Art 8, Memorandum of Understanding Concerning the Repression of Piracy and Armed Robbery Against Ships in the Western Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Aden, and the Red Sea [‘Draft Regional Counter-Piracy MOU’], IMO Sub-Regional Meeting Report, Annexe 7.

40 M Byers, ‘Policing the High Seas: The Proliferation Security Initiative’ (2004) 98 AJIL 526, 539; a list of such treaties can be found at <http://www.state.gov/s/l/2005/87199.htm>.

41 See, for example, Art 6, Agreement between Barbados and the USA Concerning Cooperation in Suppressing Illicit Maritime Drug Trafficking, 1997, <http://www.caricom.org>.

42 Art 4(5), Draft Regional Counter-Piracy MOU.

43 ibid.

44 [1934] AC 586, 594.

45 See n 17.

46 Art 9, ILC Articles on State Responsibility, reproduced in James Crawford, The International Law Commission's Articles on State Responsibility: Introduction, Text, and Commentaries (CUP, Cambridge, 2002).

47 See n 8. Politically motivated protest is also no defence to piracy (n 18).