238 Revista del Instituto Español de Estudios Estratégicos Núm. 1 / 2013 abandoned. The aim of this measure was to take over the prosecution of the pirates arrested by the military units of those countries. These agreements had meant that the ships of the signatory States had driven the pirates towards Mombasa. In practice, it meant that a warship from the international naval fleet was very often found spending several days in that port, until the processes of handing over the arrested pirates had been completed. Probably, this frequent traffic of warships towards Mombasa was a deterrence factor in making the pirates stop going into the maritime domain of Kenya. In fact, when the cancellation of the agreements had just been announced by Nairobi on September 30, 2010, pirate incidents then began happening in its waters, to the point at which 10 of the 12 attacks occurring in 2010 took place in the final quarter. This phenomenon could have affected Tanzania, Kenya’s neighbour, as well. The latter country has also suffered pirate attacks since that time. One significant case, which gave rise to a significant variation in the pattern of attacks of the Somali pirates, was the hijacking of the Malayan container ship, Albedo, by means of the use of a mother ship, a petrol tanker sailing under the Maltese flag, with the name of Polar, which is not very common. The Polar had been hijacked on October 30th, 2010, some 800 miles from the Horn of Africa. It was used as a platform for the subsequent hijacking of the Albedo, on November 26th of that particular year. In this way, the pirates were altering their usual modus operandi, based upon launching their attacks from fishing boats (dhows) and they generated a new threat, since an attack could now come from any merchant ship. The incident that occurred on February 2, 2011, should also be highlighted. After failing to hijack a tanker ship, and finding themselves with the presence of a military detachment that was coming to detain them, the pirates threatened to kill the crew that were held hostage on the mother ship if the military came near. Another interesting case was the capture of the fishing boat Vega 5, in the territorial waters of Mozambique, in December 2010. This was a ship sailing under the Mozambique flag and with a captain from the same country and that had Spanish boatswains. Both of the Spanish citizens were taken to land, with the aim of demanding a ransom for their release. The fishing boat, with the rest of its crew sill on board, was also utilised as a mother ship. This situation went on until March 14, 2011, when a military operation by the Indian navy ended with the sinking of the Vega 5, the arrest of the 61 pirates, the release of the 13 crew members and the death of a further nine of them6. Curiously, the action by the Indian Navy seemed to push the activity of the pirates towards the north in the weeks following this. They headed for the Pakistani coast, a country whose naval forces were suffering from a lack of resources7. The two Spaniards who had been held were released in May 2011 after a ransom of 5 million dollars had 6 “La Marina india libera al ‘Vega 5’ pero los dos gallegos siguen cautivos en tierra”, El Mundo, 14 de marzo de 2011; http://www.elmundo.es/elmundo/2011/03/14/galicia/1300100477.html 7 “Indian Navy nets dozens of pirates”, Safety at Sea International, may 2011, p. 15.
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