Constitution of a welfare fund for the victims of piracy
India is lobbying for a reference to the sufferings of hostages in a proposed United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolution against maritime piracy so that there is greater pressure on ship owners to resolve hijack situations.
India also wants the constitution of a welfare fund for the victims of piracy.
The UNSC is scheduled to take up a resolution on piracy April 11 that is expected to moot an international judicial mechanism for prosecuting captured pirates.
“India is hoping that this resolution will also have a reflection on the plight of hostages,” a senior external affairs ministry official told IANS, not wishing to be identified because of service rules.
According to latest figures, 53 Indian sailors are being held hostage on five different ships. Of them, 17 have been held the longest on MT Savina Caylyn, an Italian ship which was captured over a year ago Feb 8, 2010.
Russia has circulated a draft resolution which aims to set up a judicial mechanism to prosecute pirates caught by international navies patrolling the waters off the Horn of Africa. It calls for the establishment of three specialised courts, as well as the construction of two new prisons to incarcerate convicted pirates.
India is hoping that the reference to the “plight of hostages” will help in putting more pressure on ship owners and foreign governments to resolve hijack situations. “We have been observing that ship owners are often not motivated enough to negotiate with pirates… They often go slow and try to drag on talks, hoping to bring the ransom demand down,” said official.
The Indian government had already been under pressure during the last session of parliament, when the opposition had vociferously raised the quandary of the families of the Indian hostages on a captured Egyptian ship.
The families had demonstrated on the streets in Delhi demanding that the government take up a more proactive role to free the hostages. The Indian government had to explain to the people that no nation directly negotiate with the pirates.
But while India has floated the idea in the UNSC, there is opposition to the suggestion, especially from “one particular country”. “There is opposition from a major ship-owning nation as it feels that there will be too much pressure on ship owners,” said the official.
Indian diplomats in New York and New Delhi have been working with Russia and other countries on the UNSC to get this position reflected in the resolution. India hopes that if the resolution refers to hostages, there will be a “greater obligation on the part of ship owners and their national governments to take steps to ameliorate a hostage situation.”
But while Indian diplomats are lobbying hard, they are clear that its inclusion is still not a done deal. “In multilateral negotiations, you never know what is going to be the final outcome till the last moment,” the official said.
The UNSC had passed its first resolution against piracy in June 2008, when it had authorized other nations and organisations to enter the territorial waters of Somalia.
According to various sources, the world economy has lost between $7 billion to $12 billion annually due to pirate attacks. Last year, Somali pirates hijacked 49 ships and took 1,016 hostages.
So far in 2011, 14 ships have been hijacked and 250 hostages taken off the waters of Somalia.
Indian warships which have been deployed in the Gulf of Aden since 2008 have successfully escorted over 1,500 ships through the pirate-infested waters. In its latest action March 14, 61 pirates were captured by the Indian navy after it intercepted a pirate mothership some 600 nautical miles off Mumbai.
Source: IANS
