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Monday, June 04, 2012

Pirates Making Hundreds of Millions in Ransoms, as Attacks Intensify off Somali Coast

While much of the world's economy is in the doldrums, business is booming for Somalia's pirates, whose attacks on commercial ships sailing Africa's east coast are more frequent, violent and lucrative than ever.

Pirates took in an estimated $160 million in ransoms last year, and one study predicts the number will climb to $400 million by 2015, as the high seas thieves continue their brazen reign on the Indian Ocean. Efforts by shipping companies to beef up security, and by the European Union, which has mounted airstrikes on pirate ships, have so far been met with stepped-up attacks. Chillingly, pirates are now chopping off the limbs of captives in extreme cases when the airdrop of cash isn't made quickly enough to suit them.

"It's an established, structured model, where you have Somalis who are leading and financing operations and then you have pirates who actually go out to sea and conduct the activity," Brian Green, chief of the counter-piracy branch of the Office of Naval Intelligence, told FoxNews.com of the piracy industry. "They are, more or less, foot soldiers. They find targets of opportunity, attack them with the goal of hijacking and bringing that vessel back to Somalia."

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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

these are the relatives of our wonderful president.
same motto , redistribute the wealth.

Anonymous said...

How about we fly some drones over the ocean there, send a couple hellfire missiles down and take out a few boat loads of skinnys? Problem solved.

Anonymous said...

Somalia's pirates in some rowboats extract $160 million in ransoms last year?
This country should try the same thing and maybe it will get people off welfare.