239 F. Ibáñez G./ M. Á. Esteban Analysis of the Somali pirate attacks in the Indian Ocean. been paid, according to the pirates themselves8. The displacement of the pirate activity, far from the Gulf of Aden and from Somalia, has forced the international naval fleet to extend its area of action. This has had consequences that are difficult to make proportional to the area they have to protect. Given the impossibility of assembling a similar fleet, the ship-owners opted for vessels with armed security guards. According to our data, 35% of the ships that were attacked by Somali pirates in 2011 had these guards on board them. The fact that no ship with such staff on board has been hijacked is a strong incentive for the ship-owners and this explains the increase in the business of private security companies dedicated to providing maritime security services. 4.2. Somali piracy as a threat to international security Somali piracy has moved on to an advanced phase. It is not now run by a small group of impoverished Somali fishermen9. Now they have mother ships, negotiators, spokesmen, accountants, investors and logistics supervisors and they probably also have the support of the Somali diaspora in countries such as the United Kingdom or Canada. They are capable of bribing the local authorities and we should not discount the existence of some type of network of informers working from the ports that tell them about the most vulnerable targets. Entire Somali towns see how their economies depend on the hijacking of ships and the payment of the ransoms. Piracy in Somalia is carried on within the context of a civil war, which has devastated the country for twenty years. We cannot discount the fact that part of the ransoms paid to the pirates are used to finance this and even that the money is sent to terrorist groups that are affiliated with Al Qaeda, such as Al Shabab. Identifying and locating the pirates when they are out at sea is a complicated task and it requires having a broad panoply of resources available. The range from and include the air forces of the maritime patrol and unmanned planes (UAVs) to satellites. It is not easy to confront them in a proportional and discerning manner either. Not just when they have managed to hijack a ship and they are holding its crew hostage, but also at the time at which once the ransom has been paid they camouflage themselves amongst the local population that is waiting for them on land so that they can avoid being captured. Moreover, the field of battle spans over two million square miles, where pirates and fishermen, which use similar vessels, are often jumbled together, which makes it hard to differentiate between them. On the other hand, the national legislation of some of the countries involved in repressing piracy does not even contain the offence of piracy. Or, if they do contain this, the authorities prefer to avoid becoming involved in a legal process that does 8 “Liberan a los dos marineros gallegos del «Vega 5» secuestrado en Somalia”, ABC, May15, 2011. 9 LENNOX, Patrick. “Contemporary Piracy off the Horn of Africa”. Calgary: Canadian Defence & Foreign Affairs Institute, 2008, p. 10.
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