THE HUMAN FACE OF MARINE PIRACY

This presentation was made at an International Seminar on Piracy at Karachi in Feb 2012. Courtesy-proceedings issued by Fazaldad Human Rights Institute.

THE ALANDRO RAINBOW CASE

At the outset let me place on record, my gratitude, to the organizers of this seminar for making it possible for me to be sharing some thoughts with this audience. It has taken many months of diligent and sincere communications between us to cross all the obstacles to obtain the necessary clearance to travel to Karachi. I am honoured and delighted to be with you.

Since the sub-continent provides a fair share of seafarers to the shipping industry, it is but natural that we will continue to have some of our crew in ships that are hijacked. The threat is common to all of us and it is imperative that we join hands to fight together since it cuts across our existing disagreements on bilateral and historical antagonism. It is in this context that we need to revisit the Alandro Rainbow case to draw lessons that may assist the international community to find amicable solutions to the scourge of piracy at sea. Let me briefly outline the facts related to the actual act of piracy, circumstances leading to the capture of the hi-jacked ship by the Indian Maritime forces and finally lessons learnt or unlearnt as perceived by us.

This is a classical case of good coordination and cooperation among agencies such as, the Piracy reporting centre at KL, alert standards of watch keeping by ships in receipt of warnings, quick reaction by Maritime forces and clear intent to pursue the pirated vessel and capture her and finally the successful prosecution of the captured crew by courts of law in India.

On 22oct 99, Alandro Rainbow,a Japanese ship of 7762 tons, registered in Panama with a crew of 15 Philipinos and 2 Japanese was hijacked within two and half hours of leaving Kuala Tanjung in Indonesia enroute to Miike in Japan.The crew was blind folded and transferred to a barge MV Sanho and thereafter set afloat in a life raft. Fortunately the crew was rescued by a Thai trawler and the Japanese Master promptly registered a case. Consequently IMB/PRC was informed and a bulletin to look out for Alandro Rainbow was put out on 27 oct. There is also a report that Thomas Cooper an insurance company offered a reward of US $ 200000; the cargo consisting of Aluminium Ingots was worth a Billion+ Yen. What was not known at this stage was that the ship was being converted into a Phantom vessel, which was renamed as Mega Rama. Half the cargo had been disembarked and the ship had set sail to the Persian Gulf.

At the south western tip of India, MV AlShuhada,a Kuwaiti  motor vessel sighted MV Mega Rama, on 13 Nov and an alert watch keeper found  considerable resemblance with Alandro Rainbow and despite the new name on display, he promptly reported the matter to the PRC. An equally alert Coast Guard of India decided to intercept the vessel and check its credentials.

It was CG vessel Tarabhai a small inshore patrol vessel which closed in and thus commenced a chase on 14 Nov. Mega Rama neither responded nor cared to establish radio contact, while increasing speed and altering due west. A CG Dornier aircraft joined at first light and flew across the bows of the ship to reconfirm that the new name was indeed painted over. By then Lloyds records had also confirmed that the ship called Mega Rama did not exist on the record books of ships in commission.

It is at this stage of the operations that the navy decided to support the efforts of the Coast Guard. Since I was the head of operations at that time, I can with certainty, recall the factors that were considered before arriving at the decision. It was established beyond doubt that the ship being pursued was indeed Alandro Rainbow. The then Prime Minister of Japan had made a statement in their parliament on the loss of the ship and the desire of the people of Japan to repossess the ship if possible. The interpretation of existing Maritime laws and specifically articles 100 to 107 of UNCLOS were carefully considered. It was also recalled that the original Regulations Indian Navy before the recent amendments, had very specific instructions to the Commanding officer of Indian War ships to aggressively pursue pirates at sea and that insufficient action in such pursuits may invite disciplinary action against the Commanding officer.

It was also envisaged that should firing be necessitated in self defence or to persuade the ship to stop, it would necessitate graduated use of minimum force to achieve the end result. The Commanding officer should not be burdened with restrictions and that laying down clear ROE’s was the task of higher echelons of the navy.

Finally the past experience of thwarting a coup at Maldives in 1988 at the request of the then President of Male and the subsequent engagement of MV Progress Light, which resulted in rescuing the hostages and arresting the rebels had a few critical lessons, which needed to be implemented. It was with these considerations that the CNS took the decision of deploying the nearest Missile vessel and later a frigate and a destroyer, the latter to prevent scuttling of the hi-jacked vessel through a large contingent of damage control teams available in larger vessels.

Missile vessel Prahar who reached the scene of action on 15 Nov after sun set, used all the available means of communication, illuminated the vessel in question, circled her at close quarters, when the pirates tried to ram Prahar and only when all efforts failed did he start with small caliber weapon firing across the bows of Mega Rama, aka,Alandro Rainbow.

By 16 Nov it was clear that the pirates were hardened criminals with adequate knowledge of ship management skills to delay or prevent the capture of their ship. The use of the highest caliber gun system was brought into action and it needed only two shots in the vicinity of the bridge and funnel to abruptly stop the pirates. White flags were hoisted by the pirates but they had also initiated the process of scuttling the vessel. The boarding parties had two objectives, to capture the pirates and prevent the sinking of the vessel. Both having been achieved the ship was towed into Mumbai harbour by the CG on 16 Nov.

Within a period of three months thereafter, the pirated vessel with half the cargo was returned to the rightful owner. The main battle was to follow in the courts of Mumbai.

The weaknesses in existing national legislation and laws and their alignment with evolving International maritime laws, conventions/agreements and International customs were huge impediments in courts of law. Thanks to the presence of the old Admiralty courts and processes which fortuitously remained in force, the court was able to sentence and impose fine/penalties on the offenders. There were many issues of jurisdiction, identification of offenders etc which later came to light at the higher courts of law, but then the seven year penalty had almost been completed by the pirates. Also the SUA convention had not been ratified at that point in time. The legal frame work and legislation to be worked by Parliament are matters of a detailed study by legal luminaries.

Let us briefly examine some interesting findings, which are my personal thoughts in retrospection and introspection.

Firstly, Phantom ship operations which involves pirating, renaming/repainting, disposal of illegitimately acquired cargo, use of poorly regulated ports to acquire legitimate charters,inter-alia, need a lot of white collar support from shore authorities, money launderers, lawyers and the whole gamut of well qualified and authorized phantom crew to run and manage the ship. How is it that the international community and commercial/UN led initiatives have not been able to generate cooperative measures to nail them down? It is like Somalian piracy, a lucrative multi-Billion dollar industry which is convenient to all stake holders. Like tax evasion agreements could there be bilateral or multi- lateral agreements among nations?

Secondly, sharing of information and diligent patrolling among littoral nations along with time shared presence of war ships for quick and seamless intervention is a need that merits attention. India and Pakistan can work at sea without prejudice to their disagreement on ongoing political issues.
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Thirdly, in an increasingly globally net worked environment, is it not possible to 
maintain a centralized record of qualified Merchant marine officers and their whereabouts to locate those that sell their souls to indulge in piracy related activities? It would provide instant information of location and details of unemployed but 
.qualified crew who have the inclination and potential to support illegal trade

Rules of Engagement are essential to enable warship Captains to defend and use graduated and bare necessary offensive action to thwart and deter piracy. The Governments such as the Indian Govt were able to do so which led to effective neutralization of mother ships and remarkable decrease in high seas deployment of pirates.

Fourthly, it is time to create a cadre of specialists in Maritime law and nurture them by providing sufficient avenues of employment in the industry and state led initiatives. If they have a merchant marine /navy/CG background so much the better. I was delighted to meet one in Karachi, who having served the Navy is a successful legal luminary in maritime law.

I thank you for your attention.