To the dry end

Base is knocked out from under Somali pirates

The Chinese have joined the international patrol of the Gulf of Aden, where Somali pirates are rampaging and where the Russian patrol ship Neustrashimy and ships of other countries are already fighting against them. The Chinese newspaper Huanqiu Shibao (published by the same editorial office that publishes the People's Daily newspaper, the organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China) reported that at the end of December two destroyers and a military support ship will leave from Hainan Island to the Horn of Africa on a three-month mission. Chinese naval forces. The day before, on December 17, a detachment of ships patrolling the gulf under the command of a Kenyan captain freed the Chinese trawler Zhenhua-4 with 30 crew members on board, captured by sea robbers on December 16.

On this day, the UN Security Council, in accordance with Chapter VII of the UN Charter “Action against threats to the peace, breaches of the peace and acts of aggression,” unanimously adopted resolution 1851 of 13 points. At the request of Indonesia, off whose coast pirates also operate, the document removed the reference to fighting them “on the territory and airspace of Somalia.” But the sixth paragraph of the resolution states that countries and organizations involved in this fight “may take all necessary and appropriate measures in Somalia to discourage those who use the territory of Somalia to plan, facilitate or commit acts of piracy and armed robbery at sea.”

According to the Russian Foreign Ministry, this “gives the right to states cooperating with the Somali government” to operate not only in territorial waters, but also “on land territory and in the airspace of the region”: “It becomes possible to destroy the pirates’ ground infrastructure.” However, as the resolution states, measures can only be taken “with the permission and at the request of the Government of Somalia”, “while respecting human rights and international law.” The UN Security Council also decided to create an international mechanism for coordinating the fight against maritime robbery and a regional center for the exchange of information. It is planned to conclude an international agreement on the prosecution of pirates and their detention behind bars.

The weight of the mandate issued by the UN is also given by the fact that the foreign ministers of the three permanent members of the Security Council personally voted for it - Sergei Lavrov from Russia, Condoleezza Rice from the USA and David Miliband from Great Britain. All three were at negotiations in New York that day and attended a meeting of the UN Security Council. Although the draft resolution was prepared by the United States, Secretary of State Rice immediately said that the United States was not yet going to send its peacekeepers to Somalia: “We were already there, and it didn’t look too good.” In 1993, the United States hastily withdrew its peacekeeping force from Somalia after 18 U.S. Marines were ambushed and killed in Mogadishu. In the future, Rice does not rule out a land war with pirates: “But right now it is very dangerous for our military.”

During a discussion of the project, Somali Foreign Minister Ali Ahmad Jama (read his interview on this same page) exclaimed: “Piracy must be stopped!” Sergei Lavrov, after approving the resolution, told Russian journalists accompanying him on the trip, including a Vremya Novostei columnist, that the document “lays down the possibilities” for ground and air operations in Somalia in the future, but “they are not planned now” and for this “still needs to be developed specific procedures." Although there have already been UN Security Council resolutions on this issue, the need for a new document arose after requests from the Somali government for help.

The resolution, according to Lavrov, solved another important problem: “Provisions were removed from the document that could create freedom for free interpretation of actions requested by the Somali government.” So now there is no wording “that would leave room for abuse,” and “control over the operation remains in the hands of the UN Security Council”: “It will determine further steps and monitor the implementation of the current mandate issued for 12 months. In a year we will have the opportunity to evaluate the effectiveness of our efforts. Then a new UN Security Council resolution will be needed.” However, “the problem cannot be solved by force alone; active efforts are needed to stabilize Somalia socio-economically and politically, which will undermine the material basis of piracy,” putting an end to it not only at sea, but also on land.

Alexander SAMOKHOTKIN, Elena SUPONINA, New York - Moscow