Pirates seize French yacht

Pirates seize French yacht

www.cnn.com

Pirates seized control of a French luxury yacht carrying 30 crew members Friday in the Gulf of Aden off Somalia's coast, the French government and the ship's owner said.


A handout photo from the French maritime transport company CMA-CGM shows the luxury yacht Le Ponant.

Attackers stormed the three-mast Le Ponant as it returned without passengers from the Seychelles, in the Indian Ocean, toward the Mediterranean Sea, said officials with French maritime transport company CMA-CGM.

"This is a blatant act of piracy," Prime Minister Francois Fillon told reporters while on a visit to Brussels. "The Defense and Foreign ministries are mobilized to act as quickly as possible, I hope in the coming minutes or hours to try to win the freedom of these hostages."

(visit the link for the full news article)

It seems like we let this black market part of the economy persist for some reason. It seems like someone in power is benefiting from this lawlessness. Isn't this terrorism on the high seas? Who is it and what role does pirating play in the African economies?

The yacht is beautiful. I thought I heard about the US having warships on Pirate duty off the coast of Africa. Pirates? what the heck? Is it the lack of the USSR the reason for the pirate activity?


www.cnn.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

[edit on 4-4-2008 by stikkinikki]

[edit on 4-4-2008 by stikkinikki]

Originally posted by stikkinikki

Pirates? what the heck? Is it the lack of the USSR the reason for the pirate activity?

There is still alot of pirates in the seas. Piracy has been prevelant since humans first hit the seas, and it didn't stop once we became 'modern'. From what I understand there is alot of pirates in Asian waters..

See, this is what happens when you don't shoot first and ask questions later. I mean the pirates were probably waving cartons of cigarettes before boarding...
I hope the hostages are released safely.

One of the new ploys is for pirates to take the captain (or first mate) and chief engineer of a merchant ship hostage. It seems they have found that shipping companies will pay ransoms and keep the payout info out of the media.

reply to post by beaverg


Indeed I learned from that one as well. That's why I shoot the mailman each time he comes by. He waves my mail as if I would be so naive.

reply to post by roadgravel

You are correct. When I was going through from India to Singapore we are pretty much on constant watch for pirates.

when it comes to big commercial cargo/tanker ships I believe the usual procedure is to take the Capitan and chief engineer along with any valuables on the ship (laptops, etc.), they tend to leave the ship because its pretty hard to hide a 20,000 tonne tanker but they can get a lot of money for there prisoners.

According to the UN...

Piracy is a bigger problem now than it was in the days of the pirates of the Caribbean.

We just do not hear about it on the news.

Well I guess I was naive. Smarter now so thanks for the boost!

Even we laypeople know that piracy is a big problem off the coast of Somalia...WTF was a luxury yacht doing cruising around there? It's their own fault for being where they shouldn't be. We all know piracy is wrong, illegal, etc, but let's exercise some common sense, shall we? They might have been walking around a bad neighborhood with $100 bills stapled to their clothes.

reply to post by Lucid Lunacy


That's one resilient mailman... Kudos on remaining so vigilant.
You never know when your mailman is actually a pirate.

[edit on 5-4-2008 by beaverg]

I can't understand one thing- Romans wiped out piracy in Mediterranean, and were not the first to do it. Piracy in Caribbean was also stopped. Now,in the age when government has so much more power then individuals or organizations it can not be done?
Piracy is land-bound. Raid the new Tortugas and the thing is stopped. Who gains from it? Because we know who looses.

Originally posted by beaverg

That's one resilient mailman... Kudos on remaining so vigilant.
You never know when your mailman is actually a pirate.

Thanks

Well the thing is the 9 Mil doesn't have the stopping power of a 45 Hopefully I can get some aid from the US Military or 'Department of Homeland Security' to deal with this persistent terrorist.

I assume his organization is hiding biological warfare in the envelopes too

Perhaps some preemptive 'Operation Liberate USPS' would do the trick

reply to post by sc2099


Exactly,

My first thought was 'what the hell was that yacht doing there?'

A lot of people don't understand how rife piracy is these days - I'm sure the crew of Le Ponant knew this. Put is this way, there is no way you're gonna catch me on my yacht off the coast of Africa.

Piracy sucks and I think a lot more needs to be done about it. This is the one situation where I would shoot first and ask questions later - without a shadow of a doubt.

I saw a documentary about a year back that claimed a lot of these pirates were rogue navy units from third world countries like Somalia. They supplement their incomes by looting ships that enter their coastal waters.

Think about it.. How does a small ship full of pirates capture a tanker or cruise ship without having some heavy duty firepower to intimidate them with?



[edit on 4/5/08 by LLoyd45]

reply to post by more_serotonin_pls

Originally posted by more_serotonin_pls

Piracy sucks and I think a lot more needs to be done about it. This is the one situation where I would shoot first and ask questions later - without a shadow of a doubt.

Originally posted by LLoyd45

Think about it.. How does a small ship full of pirates capture a tanker or cruise ship without having some heavy duty firepower to intimidate them with?

Exactly. In this situation it wouldn't be a small trading boat.

So you wouldn't need to ask alot of the questions before you shoot, as they would be answered for you.

[edit on 063030p://5u12 by Lucid Lunacy]