History
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Piracy in Indonesia is not only notorious, but according to a survey conducted by the International Maritime Bureau, Indonesia was the country sporting the highest rate of pirate attacks back in 2004. It subsequently dropped to second place of the world's worst country of pirate attacks in 2008, finishing just behind Nigeria. [1] However, Indonesia is still deemed the country with the world's most dangerous water due to its high piracy rate. [2]
With more than half of the world's piracy crimes surrounding the South-East Asia aquatic regions, the turmoil caused by piracy has made the Strait of Malacca a distinct pirate hotspot accounting for most of the attacks in Indonesia, making the ships that sail in this region risky ever since the Europeans arrived. [1] [3] The term 'Piracy in Indonesia' includes both cases of Indonesian pirates hijacking other cargo and tanks, as well as the high rate of practising piracy within the country itself. The Strait of Malacca is also one of the world's busiest shipping routes as it accounts for more than twenty-five percent of the world's barter goods that come mainly from China and Japan. [1] Approximately 50,000 vessels worth of the world's trade employ the strait annually, including oil from the Persian Gulf and manufactured goods to the Middle East and Suez Canal. The success that stems from this trade portal makes the Strait an ideal location for pirate attacks. [4]
| | This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (October 2021) |
According to the International Maritime Bureau, the pirates are able to bypass authorities and elude detection by taking cover in numerous islands that readily surround the area. The region surrounding Indonesia alone has an estimate of over seventeen hundred islands and a seascape of tropical isles in which pirates are able to seek refuge. [3] [4] In addition, numerous major naval forces that use to patrol high seas has declined by fifty percent and this has adversely propelled the rate of pirate attacks in Indonesia. [5] Many of these crimes are conducted for ransom, but there is a huge risk involved when these pirates are illegal syndicates who hijack tug boats, barges and large tankers. These containers carry explosive natural gases that can be used as weapons. [2] The worry on piracy in Indonesia continues to soar when it was recorded back in 2012 that across the Indonesian archipelago, the number of petty thefts recorded was eighty-one and this accounts to more than one quarter of the world's piracy incidents. [6] In addition, economic drivers such as poverty and corruption also accounts to the high rates of pirate attacks. [7] As supported in a research article by David Rosenberg, the number of crimes has shot up ever since the 1997 currency crisis in Indonesia, driving numerous people to becoming pirates solely to earn a living wage. [8] According to the Bali Times, Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia are all responsible for patrolling their own regions and they do not have any jurisdiction beyond their water territories, making regional waters vulnerable and easy for pirates to escape. [1] Furthermore, with Indonesia's coastline being twice as long as the perimeter of the earth, patrolling their water territory with slightly more than a dozen vessels is clearly inadequate. [8] Within the first six months of 2012, Indonesia alone is responsible for twenty percent of the pirate attacks that happened globally. [9]
Over the last ten years, the number of pirate attacks in Indonesia has dropped. However, there are still numerous reports on piracy occurring along coastal areas and gulfs. In 2011, 15 attacks were recorded in the month of January alone, where five attacks amounted to the total number of crimes during the first quarter of that respective year. [10] In addition, during the month of September in that same year, two incidents of pirate attacks were reported. The first group consisted of four Indonesian pirates who were being arrested where they confessed that they aided and abetted a larger syndicate that operated in the Strait of Malacca. [11] The second group of attackers during that month included six Indonesian men who were being detained. They were suspects for a group of Indonesian pirates that allegedly boarded a merchant vessel in Singapore. During the attack, warning shots were being fired and the pirates fled the scene. It is believed that the group arrived from Batam, an island that was closely situated to the Strait. [12]
In 2012, four pirates boarded a Bulk Carrier in Gresik Inner Anchorage, Indonesia, and entered the forward ship's store. They managed to escape when a crew spotted them, but the pirates made off with a few property from the store. [13]
Back in 2003, CNN reported that unless the Indonesian government enforces sea patrol, the crime rates for piracy will not be dropping anytime soon. [2] However, after an attack back in the 1990s, Indonesia has partnered with Singapore and Malaysia to safeguard, monitor and ensure the security and safety of the water that borders outside their respective territory. One way to aid the problem, as reported by the International Maritime Bureau, is to be vigilant because pirates often abandon their attacks the moment they are being spotted. This is why the relationship between ship and water is vital. [14] According to the Oceans Beyond Piracy, which is a project that looks to develop a multi-stakeholders response to piracy, they reported that a cooperative security measure undertaken by Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand ensures the security of the Strait of Malacca by instilling the Malacca Strait Patrols (MSP). The MSP comprises the Malacca Strait Sea Patrol (MSSP), the Eyes in the Sky (EiS) and the Intelligence Exchange Group (IEG) and the information that is being gathered on pirate attacks in Indonesia is being facilitated and shared between the countries. Furthermore, co-ordinated patrols have also been established. [15] In September 2011, two warships were being deployed by Indonesia and Malaysia as part of a collaboration patrol to supervise pirate attacks at the Strait of Malacca. [16] As recorded by Time World, an Indonesian naval officer claimed that they would be no match for the pirates back in 2004 because there were easy attacks-and-escape routes that made hunting these pirates down radically impossible. The number of attacks during 2004 also reached its crisis level. However, as of 2009, this problem has been countered as the rate of pirate crimes have dissipated. [4] Although the number of pirate attacks that have occurred in the first quarter of the year in 2009 has almost doubled in comparison to the same period the year before, only one pirate attack took place in Indonesia as opposed to the 102 attacks that happened globally. The solution, as mentioned by the director of the International Marine Bureau in London, said that good coordination and cooperation from regional governments play a part in deterring the attacks on commercial shipping, because cohesive supervision leads to a riskier task for the pirates. [4]
Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and other valuable goods. Those who conduct acts of piracy are called pirates, and vessels used for piracy are called pirate ships. The earliest documented instances of piracy were in the 14th century BC, when the Sea Peoples, a group of ocean raiders, attacked the ships of the Aegean and Mediterranean civilisations. Narrow channels which funnel shipping into predictable routes have long created opportunities for piracy, as well as for privateering and commerce raiding.
The Strait of Malacca is a narrow stretch of water, 800 kilometres (500 mi) long and from 65 to 250 km wide, between the Malay Peninsula to the northeast and the Indonesian island of Sumatra to the southwest, connecting the Andaman Sea and the South China Sea. As the main shipping channel between the Indian and Pacific oceans, it is one of the most important shipping lanes in the world. It is named after the Malacca Sultanate that ruled over the strait between 1400 and 1511, the center of administration of which was located in the modern-day state of Malacca, Malaysia.
The Republic of Singapore Navy (RSN) is the maritime service branch of the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) responsible for defending the country against any seaborne threats and as a guarantor of its sea lines of communications. The RSN traces its origins to the Royal Navy when Singapore was still a crown colony of the British Empire. The service was formally established in 1967, two years after its independence from Malaysia in 1965, and had undergone a substantial modernisation ever since – which has led them into becoming the most powerful navy in Southeast Asia.
The Orang Laut are several seafaring ethnic groups and tribes living around Singapore, Peninsular Malaysia and the Indonesian Riau Islands. The Orang Laut are commonly identified as the Orang Seletar from the Straits of Johor, but the term may also refer to any Malayic-speaking people living on coastal islands, including those of the Mergui Archipelago in Myanmar and Thailand, commonly known as Moken.
The Singapore Strait is a 113 km-long (70 mi), 19 km-wide (12 mi) strait between the Strait of Malacca in the west and the South China Sea in the east. Singapore is on the north of the channel, and the Indonesian Riau Islands are on the south. The two countries share a maritime border along the strait.
A sea lane, sea road or shipping lane is a regularly used navigable route for large water vessels (ships) on wide waterways such as oceans and large lakes, and is preferably safe, direct and economic. During the Age of Sail, they were determined by the distribution of land masses but also by the prevailing winds, whose discovery was crucial for the success of long maritime voyages. Sea lanes are very important for seaborne trade.
Piracy in the Strait of Malacca has long been a threat to ship owners and the mariners who ply the 900 km-long sea lane. In recent years, coordinated patrols by Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Singapore along with increased security on vessels have sparked a sharp downturn in piracy.
Piracy in the Gulf of Guinea affects a number of countries in West Africa as well as the wider international community. By 2011, it had become an issue of global concern. Pirates in the Gulf of Guinea are often part of heavily armed criminal enterprises, who employ violent methods to steal oil cargo. In 2012, the International Maritime Bureau (IMB), Oceans Beyond Piracy and the Maritime Piracy Humanitarian Response Program reported that the number of vessels attacks by West African pirates had reached a world high, with 966 seafarers attacked during the year. According to the Control Risks Group, pirate attacks in the Gulf of Guinea had by mid-November 2013 maintained a steady level of around 100 attempted hijackings in the year, a close second behind the Strait of Malacca in Southeast Asia.
Piracy off the coast of Somalia occurs in the Gulf of Aden, Guardafui Channel, and Somali Sea, in Somali territorial waters and other surrounding places and has a long troubled history with different perspectives from different communities. It was initially a threat to international fishing vessels during the early 2000s, only to rapidly escalate and expand to international shipping during the War in Somalia (2006–2009).
The Andaman and Nicobar Command (ANC) is a integrated tri-services command of the Indian Armed Forces, based at Port Blair in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, a Union Territory of India. It was created in 2001 to safeguard India's strategic interests in Southeast Asia and the Strait of Malacca by increasing rapid deployment of military assets in the region. It provides logistical and administrative support to naval ships which are sent on deployment to East Asia and the Pacific Ocean.
The Marine Assault Team (MAST), formally known as the UNGERIN is a maritime counter terrorism and tactical unit of the Royal Malaysia Police's Marine Operations Force. Having become fully operational in 2007, the UNGERIN conducts anti-piracy and counter-terrorism operations in the coastal waters surrounding Malaysia and assists the marine police to respond swiftly.
The Marine Police Force, Royal Malaysia Police is the Marine Police division of the Royal Malaysia Police tasked with maintaining law and order and execute national security operations in the Malaysian Territorial Waters (MTW) and no boundaries till the high seas. The Marine Police Force serves under the control of the Malaysian Internal Security & Public Order (ISPO) Department with the role of safeguarding the security of Malaysian waters from any threats.
Piracy in the 21st century has taken place in a number of waters around the world, including the Gulf of Guinea, Strait of Malacca, Sulu and Celebes Seas, Indian Ocean, and Falcon Lake.
The Sulu and Celebes Seas, a semi-enclosed sea area and porous region that covers an area of space around 1 million square kilometres, have been subject to illegal maritime activities since the pre-colonial era and continue to pose a maritime security threat to bordering nations up to this day. While piracy has long been identified as an ubiquitous challenge, being historically interwoven with the region, recent incidents also include other types of maritime crimes such as kidnapping and the trafficking of humans, arms and drugs. Attacks mostly classify as 'armed robbery against ships' according to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea as they occur in maritime zones that lie under the sovereignty of a coastal state. Incidents in the Sulu and Celebes Seas specifically involve the abduction of crew members. Since March 2016, the Information Sharing Centre (ISC) of the Regional Cooperation Agreement on Combating Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships in Asia (ReCAAP) reports a total of 86 abductions, leading to the issue of a warning for ships transpassing the area.
On 18 November 2012, eleven Indonesian pirates hijacked MT Zafirah, a Malaysian tanker, in the South China Sea. The tanker crew was left by the pirates on a lifeboat in the sea two days after the hijacking but were subsequently rescued by Vietnamese fishing vessels on 21 November when their lifeboat was drifting around 118 nautical miles in the waters off Vietnam's southern Bà Rịa–Vũng Tàu province. All the pirates managed to be tracked by Vietnam Coast Guard and Vietnam People's Navy with information provided by Malaysian based International Maritime Bureau and Singaporean based RECAAP, which led to their arrest after a brief of standoff near Vũng Tàu port.
This timeline of piracy in the 1990s is a chronological list of key events involving pirates between 1990 and 1999.
Maritime terrorism in Southeast Asia refers to acts of extreme maritime violence committed with political motives within the Southeast Asian region. Despite seaborne terrorist attacks accounting for only 2% of all international terrorist incidents from 1978 to 2008, according to RAND's Terrorism Database, Southeast Asia has proven a hotbed of maritime terrorism. Due to the high frequency of pirates in the region, many Southeast Asian-based terrorist groups have appropriated piratical tactics in carrying out their violent political struggles. In 2003, the International Maritime Bureau reported that out of the 445 actual or attempted piratical attacks on merchant vessels, 189 occurred in Southeast Asia, which was more cases than either Africa or Latin America, with 121 attacks occurring in Indonesian waters and 35 attacks occurring in Malaysian and Singaporean waters. In 2004, while the number of actual and attempted attacks fell to 325, Southeast Asia remained at the top of the regional rankings, with 93 incidents occurring in Indonesian waters. Between 2014 and 2018, 242 attacks occurred in Southeast Asia, with the majority occurring in Indonesian waters. The most popular weapons of choice among Southeast Asian maritime terrorists have been explosive devices and firearms, which were used in roughly 60% of maritime attacks in the region.
Piracy kidnappings occur during piracy, when people are kidnapped by pirates or taken hostage. Article 1 of the United Nations International Convention against the Taking of Hostages defines a hostage-taker as "any person who seizes or detains and threatens to kill, to injure, or to continue to detain another person in order to compel a third party namely, a State, an international intergovernmental organization, a natural or Juridical person, or a group of people, to do or abstain from doing any act as an explicit or implicit condition tor the release of the hostage commits the offense of taking of hostages ("hostage-taking") within the meaning of this convention." Kidnappers often try to obtain the largest financial reward possible in exchange for hostages, but piracy kidnappings can also be politically motivated.
Frequent incidents of piracy and armed robbery in the Singapore Strait have led to the area being labelled as an area of concern by the Regional Cooperation Agreement on Combating Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships in Asia (RECAAP). The Singapore Strait is located south of Singapore, south-east of Malaysia and north of the Indonesian Riau Islands. The Singapore Strait is roughly 113 km long with an average width of 19 km. The Singapore Strait was the location of 65% of all incidents of piracy and armed robbery which occurred in Asia in 2022, marking a seven year high in recorded incidents of piracy and armed robbery in the area.
2024 in piracy included 33 reports of maritime piracy and armed robbery against ships to the International Maritime Bureau during the first quarter of the year. Incidents included 24 vessels boarded, six of which experienced attempted attacks; two hijacked; and one fired upon. Crew continued to suffer violence, with 35 crew taken hostage, nine kidnapped, and one threatened during three first three months of the year.
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