The Pirates of Somalia_ Inside Their Hidden World - Jay Bahadur [122]
CHAPTER 2: A SHORT HISTORY OF PIRACY
I am indebted to Stig Jarle Hansen for his excellent work on the history and origins of piracy in Somalia, much of which is reproduced in this chapter.
1. Aidan Hartley, The Zanzibar Chest (London: Harper Perennial, 2004), 184.
2. United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), Garowe: First Steps Towards Strategic Urban Planning (Nairobi: UN-Habitat, 2008), http://www.unhabitat.org/pmss, 4.
3. Although cousins on the Somali clan tree, the Majerteen, Dhulbahante, and Warsangali have never been the best of friends. Dating back to before the Majerteen sultanates of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the Majerteen have traditionally dominated their Harti kinsmen, a pattern that continues to the present day. There were allegations that, before and during the Garowe conference, Abdullahi Yusuf strong-armed Warsangali and Dhulbahante leaders into supporting the creation of Puntland, which was certain to be controlled primarily by the Majerteen. In any case, the Dhulbahante- and Warsangali-inhabited regions of Puntland have never been much more than nominally under the control of the region’s central government; in 2005, Warsangali leaders in Sanaag region established their own short-lived breakaway mini-state, Makhir, and in 2007 many Dhulbahante clan leaders switched their allegiance to Somaliland, resulting in the secession of the town of Las Anod.
4. Quoted in Jeffrey Gettleman, “For Somali Pirates, Worst Enemy May Be on Shore,” New York Times, May 8, 2009, http://www.nytimes.com.
5. Stig Jarle Hansen, Piracy in the Greater Gulf of Aden: Myths, Misconceptions and Remedies, NIBR Report 2009:29 (Oslo: Norwegian Institute for Urban and Regional Research, 2009), http://en.nibr.no, 20.
6. Ibid., 20.
7. Ibid., 22.
8. Anonymous interviewee quoted ibid., 23–24.
9. Quoted ibid., 24.
10. UN Monitoring Group on Somalia, Report of the Monitoring Group on Somalia pursuant to Security Council resolution 1630 (2005), S/2006/229, May 4, 2006, http://www.un.org/sc/committees/751/mongroup.shtml, 27.
11. Kismaayo, though far south of Puntland, contains a substantial population of Isse Mahamoud, which is Garaad’s clan.
12. “Hijackers of Food-Laden Ship Make New Demands,” IRIN, August 15, 2005, http://www.irinnews.org.
13. The Faina was originally hijacked by Afweyne’s militias, who brought it to Harardheere. But when the ransom negotiations dragged on for months and operating expenses continued to mount, the gang was forced to turn to the Eyl pirate group to share the costs.
14. Hansen, Piracy, 23.
15. United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Annual Report 2005 Activities and Use of Extrabudgetary Funds (New York, 2005), http://ochaonline.un.org, 170.
16. In Eyl, 40 boats were destroyed and 70 damaged, out of a total of 145. Hermann M. Fritz and Jose C. Borrero, “Field Survey after the December 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami,” Earthquake Spectra 22, no. S3 (June 2006): S219; United Nations Development Programme, Tsunami Inter-Agency Assessment Mission: Hafun to Gara’ad, Northeast Somali Coastline, 28 Jan–8 Feb 2005, March 30, 2005, http://www.undp.org/cpr/disred/tsunami/news/march05.htm, 4.
17. Interestingly, however, poverty levels within Somalia do not appear to be directly correlated to the prevalence of piracy. Hansen, Piracy, 15.
18. “Exchange Rate Drops in Puntland Markets,” Garowe Online, March 7, 2009, http://www.garoweonline.com.
19. Ibid.
20. The salary of a Darawish soldier