Modern Pirates Help Fund Terrorist Groups!
I know you’ve been hearing about all of these bold & brazen pirate attacks off the coast of Somalia. It’s nothing like the “Pirates of the Carribean” either. There’s nothing to romanticize here. These pirates are hijacking an alarming number of ships. They have gotten so out of control that the world is being forced to take notice. But, piracy has put parts of Asia in a predicament as well. On uniorb.com there is an article that details the pirates of Southeast Asia.It was a bigger dilemna than Somalia is right now back in 2004 . Here’s an excerpt:
“The Straits of Malacca has a long history of sea piracy, dating back to the arrival of European colonizers. In those days, piracy plagued the waters of Southeast Asia as a form of rebellion against the foreign rulers. Social poverty drove many Southeast Asian individuals to pursue piracy to make a living. In defense, the British and the Dutch drew a demarcation line dividing the Straits of Malacca, with the agreement to hunt down pirates within their own spheres of influence. To this very day, the British-Dutch demarcation line separating Malaysia from Indonesia remains a border problem in combating piracy.
Indonesia, an archipelago of more than 17,000 islands, has been thrown into limelight after the catastrophic tsunami in December 2004, followed by two destructive earthquakes in Sumatra in 2005. Still reeling from the natural disasters, the nation has been plagued with increasingly perilous piracy in its waters, drawing international outcry for more security and effective measures to protect tankers, container and cargo ships, yachts and fishing boats. However, during the presence of international relief operations for tsunami victims in the Aceh region, piracy actually ceased for two months but later resumed more violently after the departure of the foreign naval ships.
The IMB believes from eyewitness testimonies and reports that the vast majority of pirates in the Straits of Malacca are Indonesian in origin. Apparently, the Indonesian Navy seems to be far from adequate to curtail the sea menace — lacking modern equipment and sufficient ships for pursuits (only 30% ships are considered seaworthy), and short of resources for patrolling Indonesia’s sprawling territories. Nevertheless, the Indonesian Navy has positioned six battleships in the Straits with more than 20 ships and 10 aircraft to conduct daily traffic patrols.”(End of Excerpt) Read the rest here:http://uniorb.com/ATREND/piracy.htm
But even though these rogue pirates are not operating anywhere near the shores of the United States, there actions are affecting trade among other things.Here’s an excerpt from guardian.co.uk with more on this matter:
” The actions of the pirates could hurt consumers worldwide, Roger Middleton, an author who studies piracy in Somalia, writes, also in the Times. If international shipping reacts by avoiding the route via the Gulf of Aden and the Suez canal and taking the longer way around the Cape of Good Hope, someone will have to pay – very probably the consumer.
The latest act of piracy prompts reflection on Somalia’s parlous state. Simon Tisdall in the Guardian reminds us that Somalia is arguably the world’s biggest single humanitarian disaster; more serious than Darfur, Zimbabwe and eastern Congo. Yet, he says, leading countries and their navies seem more exercised about safeguarding sea lanes than helping the 3.25 million Somalis – 43% of the population – who are dependent on food aid.
The Bush administration bears much responsibility for Somalia’s state of anarchy, Martin Fletcher argues in the Times. Because of the “war on terror”, the US backed an invasion of Somalia by Ethiopia to throw out the Islamic courts movement which had brought a semblance of stability. Fletcher says the intervention helped destroy Somalia’s best chance of peace for a generation and, far from stamping out militancy, turned Somalia into a breeding ground for Islamist extremists and gave al-Qaida a valuable foothold in the Horn of Africa.”(End of Excerpt) Read the whole thing here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/blog/2008/nov/18/somalia-piracy
This video talks about the way the United Nations dealt with the conflict & you can see how some Somali human rights activists felt that the help was not genuine. Here’s a link to a great site that traces the history of Somalia’s conflicts:http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/somalia.htm
This is an excerpt from that site:
“Subsequent fighting among rival faction leaders resulted in the killing, dislocation, and starvation of thousands of Somalis and led the United Nations to intervene militarily in 1992. In 1992, responding to the political chaos and humanitarian disaster in Somalia, the United States and other nations launched peacekeeping operations to create an environment in which assistance could be delivered to the Somali people. By March 1993, the potential for mass starvation in Somalia had been overcome, but the security situation remained fragile. On October 3, 1993 U.S. troops received significant causalities (19 dead over 80 others wounded) in a battle with Somali gunmen. When the United States (in 1994) and the UN withdrew (in 1995) their forces from Somalia, after suffering significant casualties, order still had not been restored.
Conflict between rival warlords and their factions continued throughout the 1990s. No stable government emerged to take control of the country. The UN assisted Somalia somewhat with food aid but did not send peacekeeping troops into the country. In the late 1990s, relative calm began to emerge and economic development accelerated somewhat. The country was by no means stable, but it was improving. A transitional government emerged in 2000 but soon lost power. Somaliland and Puntland, two regions in the north broke away from the country and set up regional, semi-autonomous governments. They are not internationally recognized.” (End of Excerpt)
http://www.mixedheritagecenter.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1471&Itemid=29
November 1, 2008
Is Sarah Palin A Socialist? Keith Olbermann Says So & Even Fox News Ponders The Question!
Sarah Palin is not exactly the right person to call someone a “socialist.” She did “spread the wealth” in Alaska after all. But as we know, this whole election has been a showcase of hypocrisy. Even Fox news, who usually delivers Republican talking points, have pointed out that Alaska is also known as “America’s socialist state” because of Sarah Palin. Here is an excerpt from Fox News :
“John McCain and Sarah Palin have escalated their campaign to peg Barack Obama as a wealth-spreading socialist — but the principles they accuse Obama of espousing are not foreign to the governor of what some call America’s socialist state.
In Alaska, where Palin is governor, natural resources are state-owned, and Alaska residents receive yearly dividend checks from a $30 billion state account built largely from oil royalties.
However, Palin has in touting her state’s policies used language similar to the “spread the wealth” comment made by Obama that has since drawn fire from Republicans.
“We share in the wealth when the development of these resources occurs,” she was quoted as saying in a recent New Yorker article. “It’s to maximize benefits for Alaskans, not an individual company.”
In a January address to Alaskans, Palin praised “our commonly owned natural resources” as a “state treasure.”
And in a July column in the Anchorage Daily News, she was quoted as saying: “These payments represent a distribution of Alaska’s resource wealth to the owners of the resource.”
When home fuel and gas costs soared this year, Palin raised taxes on oil companies and used some of the money to boost residents’ checks by $1,200. Every eligible man, woman and child got a record $3,269 this fall.” (End of Excerpt) Read the full article here:
http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/10/30/palins-alaska-shares-oil-wealth-residents/
Is Sarah Palin a hypocrite for accusing Obama of “spreading the wealth” considering she has done just that in Alaska? Leave a comment.
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