On a Vital Route, a Boom in Piracy

Somali Marauders Step Up Attacks in Gulf of Aden; Shipping Costs Soar

ABOARD A YEMENI COAST GUARD VESSEL -- Somali pirates plying the Gulf of Aden in speedboats equipped with grenade launchers and scaling ladders have launched what the maritime industry calls the biggest surge of piracy in modern times, sending shipping costs soaring and the world's navies scrambling to protect the main water route from Asia and the Middle East to Europe.

Pirates from the failed African state of Somalia have attacked at least 61 ships in and around the Gulf of Aden this year, 17 of them in the first two weeks of September alone, according to the International Maritime Bureau's Piracy Reporting Center in Malaysia. That compares with 13 attacks in the area for all of 2007.

"In my time here, I must say, this is the most concentrated period of destabilizing activity I have seen in the Gulf of Aden," said British Commodore Keith Winstanley, deputy commander of the Combined Maritime Forces, whose members have confronted the pirates repeatedly since mid-August. The coalition, headquartered in Bahrain, includes the militaries of the United States and 19 other nations.

The latest hijackings include the capture off Somalia on Thursday of a Ukrainian cargo vessel with 33 Russian-made T-72 tanks aboard, as well as ammunition. As of Friday, the Somali pirates were holding 14 oil tankers, cargo vessels and other ships with a total of more than 300 crew members, demanding ransoms of $1 million or more per ship.

Worldwide, pirates attacked 263 vessels in 2007, up from 239 in 2006, according to the Piracy Reporting Center. Southeast Asia, including the shipping lanes of the Malacca Straits, was long one of the world's busiest places for pirate attacks. Better cooperation by nations in the region has helped reduce attacks; however, attacks by pirates based in Somalia and Nigeria have climbed, the center said.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has been a leader in efforts to rally an international coalition against the Somali pirates, after twice sending French commandos this year to rescue French yachts captured in the Gulf of Aden.

Overtaken by hijackers armed with automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades, targeted crews seldom try to fight off the pirates.

"Between the time you see them and the time they control the ship, it takes 15 minutes, maximum," said Patrick Marchesseau, captain of the French luxury yacht Le Ponant, hijacked in April with its 30 crew members as it headed to the port of Aden, in Yemen.

Marchesseau at first ordered his crew to use the yacht's fire hose against the pirates, he recounted by telephone from France. "As soon as they started to use their Kalashnikovs," however, the crew surrendered, Marchesseau said. "We were not there to risk our lives."

Marchesseau said the hijackers were Somali men, most in their 20s, chewing night and day on wads of khat leaves, which act as a stimulant. The pirates told the hostages they were moderate Muslims, not armed religious extremists, and intended no injury.

"We just want the money," Marchesseau quoted the pirates as telling him.

The pirates freed the crew of Le Ponant after the yacht's owner paid more than $1 million in ransom, Marchesseau said.