Somali Pirates

We recently watched a video in class about piracy and the reasons to why there is piracy going on in Somalia. These men known as pirates take ships and hold them at ransom, this has become in a sense a business for many of the people, and has given the people of Somalia a bad name because of it but there is also a bigger picture behind this. From further research about these Somali pirates it says they take and hold other ships at ransom because of the wrong doing of these other countries ships dumping toxic waste on to Somali shores and waters. Making it a unsafe environment to live in for the country. For example, nuclear waste has been dumped onto the shores of Somalia along with the resources that people need have been affected from the wrongs of these criminals. The waste in turns kills and pollutes the fish along with other resources that the people of Somalia use, which then causes health issues. This is in turn is a cycle because people that are of power like the United Nations aren't doing anything to stop this from happening, but they want prevent piracy from happening but its not as long as ships keep coming dumping waste on to their shores and no one else doing anything about it.

The media has really taken this story and turned it into a whole mess. Initially I didn't know the real reason behind the pirate attacks; I didn't even know where this was occurring and who the pirates were until I watched the video. In fact I didn't know any of this was going on because the media controls everything and tells us what they want us to hear. This of course is an issue that is going on continuously without an end because of the big business aspects of the ransoms. The media has once again suppressed our minds. Individuals around the world do not know of the toxic waste or theft due to illegal fishing. Canadians and Europeans are mostly to blame for both of these incidents because they're the main one coming in to Somali borders and dumping these toxic wastes. This is a cycle that is both the problem and added issues.

While much of the world's economy is in the doldrums, business is booming for Somalia's pirates, whose attacks on commercial ships sailing Africa's east coast are more frequent, violent and lucrative than ever. Pirates took in an estimated $160 million in ransoms last year, and one study predicts the number will climb to $400 million by 2015, as the high seas thieves continue their brazen reign on the Indian Ocean. Efforts by shipping companies to beef up security, and by the European Union, which has mounted airstrikes on pirate ships, have so far been met with stepped-up attacks. This comes to me as a surprise, because all these people want is there waters and for the waters to be clean of waste and their fish to go to the rightful people. In 2011 attacks were at an all time high.

Somalians have every God given right to protect their own waters along with food and