Maritime piracy in the strategic sea lanes of communications (SLOCs) of the Indian Ocean has assumed serious proportions in recent years. Coupled with growing terrorist activities, particularly in the aftermath of 9/11 and the possibility of Al-Qaeda groups possessing weapons of mass destructions (WMDs) have further heightened the maritime security concerns of the littorals of the India Ocean, including India. Bulk of to and fro foreign trade of the East Asian and ASEAN countries as well as countries of South Asia passes through the SLOCs like the Straits of Malacca, Sunda, Lombok and Makassar in Southeast Asia, and the Straits of Tsushima, Tsugaru, Osumi, and Soya (La Perouse) in Northeast Asia. Major shipping routes in the Asia-Pacific are through these key straits. Due to their potential for closure, these straits are known as chokepoints.
The Strait of Malacca, being the main corridor between the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea, has more than 280 ship movements in both directions per day at present, and About 26 tankers, including three fully loaded supertankers heading for Asian ports, pass through the strait daily. Tankers using the waterway by 2010 will be two to three times more than today. The Lombok Strait is used by largest ships over 100,000 DWT (dead weight tonnage). Most ships transiting the Lombok Strait also pass through the Makassar Strait. The Sunda Strait is 50 miles long and is another alternative to the Malacca Strait. Its northeastern entrance is 15 miles wide. But because its northern part is relatively shallow with dangerous currents, it is not heavily used, and deep-draught ships of over 100,000 DWT do not transit the Strait.
The Strait of Tsushima, being part of the Korea Strait, is the major link between the East China Sea and the Sea of Japan. Having a length of about 138 miles, its narrowest point is 25 miles wide, and its deepest point is 129 meters. It is heavily used by vessels traveling to and from the east coast of South Korea, western Japan, and Vladivostok of Russia. The Strait of Tsugaru, located between Japan’s Hokkaido and Honshu Islands, connects the Sea of Japan with the North Pacific Ocean. It is 71.5 miles long. Its narrowest point is 10.1 miles wide, and the deepest point of the navigable channel is 521 meters. The Osumi Strait is a major connection from the Yellow Sea and the East China Sea to the Pacific. The Strait of Soya (La Perouse) connects the Sea of Japan with the Sea of Okhotsk. Its narrowest point is 20 miles wide, and its depth is 30-60 meters.
The volume of major sea-trade commodities in the Asia Pacific presently is about 2 billion tons, comprising over one-third of the world’s maritime trade volume. About 15 % of the total volume of world trade passes through the Southeast Asian SLOCs. Currently, regional countries using the major East Asian SLOCs for international trade amounts to over US$ one trillion, with 54.5% being Northeast Asian trade and 45.4 % being Southeast Asian trade. Among them, Japan’s and China’s total trade via Southeast Asian lines was US$ 260.4 billion and US$ 65.6 billion respectively, 39 % and 27 % respectively of their total trade. For South Korea, the shipping routes linking the Strait of Hormuz, Malacca-Singapore straits and Southeast Asian waters form the most important ocean routes used to import strategic commodities. Crude oil, grain, coal and iron ore are the major commodities brought on northbound East Asian SLOCs, while manufactured products are the main commodities that pass through the southbound shipping on the East Asian SLOCs.
Big Powers’ Competition
Dual problems of maritime security and competition between China, India, Japan and the United States for influence confront the maritime traffic through the SLOCs of the Indian Ocean. Big powers have both coincident and conflicting interests in the security of the sea lanes–safeguarding them for themselves and possibly denying their use to potential enemies.
Thus China is actively engaged in establishing a ‘string of pearls’ or logistical support areas for its navy along the major sea lane carrying its oil from the Middle East through the Malacca and Singapore straits. Beijing has offered technical assistance to enhance the safety and security of these strategic straits. Japan is heavily dependent on the straits and the South China Sea as routes for its oil imports.
India is expanding its naval assets and its naval sphere of influence eastwards to include the straits as well as the South China Sea. The growing Indo-US military cooperation, particularly between navies is viewed by some analysts as being encouraged by Washington and Tokyo as a counterweight to China.
In the aftermath of 9/11, the United States has shown a renewed interest in maritime security of Southeast Asia, particularly the Sulu Sea, the Malacca and Singapore straits. As part of their Southeast Asian diplomatic initiatives, China, India and Japan have already acceded to the Bali Treaty of Amity and Accord. Washington has also evinced keen interest to join the treaty. The United States is also developing a strategic partnership with some ASEAN nations.
Threat of Piracy
Maritime piracy is a growing threat to commercial shipping. According to the Piracy Reporting Center at the International Maritime Bureau (IMB), pirate attacks rose by 20 percent in 2003 to 445 incidents. The attacks are not only costly in terms of business losses; they can also be deadly. Pirates killed 21 crewmembers in 2003, using weapons such as rocket-propelled grenades and recoilless rifles. And these attacks are not carried out by rogue criminals but by sophisticated syndicates. Given that the loot per vessel ranges from $8 million to $200 million, piracy has matured into a branch of organized crime, with political or terrorist connections in some cases. As such, the fight against piracy has worldwide economic and security implications.
Indonesia, Singapore, and Malaysia remain the most pirate-infested zones in the world, accounting for more than a quarter of the attacks, followed by the Indian subcontinent. But the problem is not confined to those regions of the world. In recent years, African countries have seen a spurt in piracy.
In addition, local villagers along the coasts of Indonesia, Malaysia, and Africa welcome pirate business and provide the perpetrators with proper facilities. In many countries in Southeast Asia, Latin America, and Africa, coast guard operatives, corrupt drug agents, and other law enforcement officials moonlight as pirates. Renegade members of British-trained Indonesian anti-piracy squads still roam the Malacca Straits.
Some piracy is politically motivated. For instance, Indonesian authorities blame most of the piracy attacks in that region on the Free Aceh Movement also known as Gerakan Aceh Merdeka (GAM), which is seeking to break off from Jakarta and set up an independent state. GAM has been fighting since 1975 for independence for the gas- and oil-rich region on the northern tip of Sumatra, about 1,100 miles northwest of Jakarta. Asian intelligence agencies believe that GAM is working in tandem with al Qaeda, which has reportedly shifted its base from Afghanistan to Aceh. In many cases, maritime terrorism goes beyond piracy for economic gain, with the focus more on disrupting operations and causing harm.
The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, which entered into force on November 16, 1994, incorporates the notion that “all problems of ocean space are closely interrelated and need to be addressed as a whole. Today it is the globally recognized regime dealing with all matters relating to the law of the sea. From a strictly legal perspective there is very little piracy per se in the world today. The standard legal definition of piracy that is used in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, states that piracy is:
(a) Any illegal acts of violence or detention, or any act of depredation, committed for private ends by the crew or the passengers of a private ship or a private aircraft, and directed:
(i) On the high seas, against another ship or aircraft, or against persons or property on board such ship or aircraft;
(ii) Against a ship, aircraft, persons or property in a place outside the jurisdiction of any State;
(b) Any act of voluntary participation in the operation of a ship or of an aircraft with knowledge of facts making it a pirate ship or aircraft;
(c) Any act inciting or of intentionally facilitating an act described in sub-paragraph (a) or (b).
The problem with this definition is that most pirate attacks occur within the twelve-mile limit of a state’s territorial waters and not on the high seas. Therefore such incidents are not legally considered piracy; they are in fact armed robbery. To overcome this problem the IMB has adopted the following broad definition: “Piracy is an act of boarding any vessel with the intent to commit theft or any other crime and with the intent or capability to use force in the furtherance of that act.”
However, this wider definition, which encompasses all acts regardless of the location of the vessel, has no status in international law. For the purposes of this paper the IMB’s definition of piracy will be adopted, as few acts of piracy in Southeast Asia take place on the high seas. Most attacks take place within territorial waters, as is the case along most of the Straits of Malacca, or within archipelagic waters such as those of Indonesia or the Philippines.
India’s Stance
Keeping in view the mounting menace of maritime piracy, the maritime powers of the Indian Ocean have been contemplating of exploring the possibility of asking for patrolling assistance informally from the Maritime Powers like India, South Africa, Australia, China and, of course, the United States. Recently, India’s External Affairs Minister had given his nod ‘in principle’, it could have been seen as an extension of several such policing requests made to India lately (there have been such requests from Mozambique and Mauritius).
The new Indian maritime doctrine also lays down multilateral naval cooperation as one of the guiding principles for naval forces to address common security concerns like protection of sea- lanes, terrorism, piracy, drug trafficking and transportation of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) by sea. Besides being an endeavour to ‘build bridges of friendship’, providing security to the Malacca Straits is also vital for India due to the economic importance of energy and trade flow.
India has expanding vital trading interests in the east with ASEAN and East Asia. With ASEAN, India’s trade grew by 30 per cent from US $7.6 b in 1999 to US $12.5 b in 2002 and it is projected to reach US $30 b by 2010. With China, it increased from US $3.6 b in 2001 to US $7.59 b in 2003. Though trade with Japan has been fluctuating it still remains one of India’s major trading partners. Trade with South Korea stood at just US $2 b, but it went up by 42 per cent till May 2004 (as compared to the corresponding period in the previous year). India’s energy demands are also heavy and growing and are projected to more than double by 2020. Insecure due to its heavy dependence on the Middle East, it intends to diversify its sources of energy in the East. Hence, security of its eastern sea-lanes is crucial for New Delhi.
Besides, the mercantile traffic transiting through the Malacca Straits passes through India’s maritime zone and any contingency in the straits has security and environmental implications for India. Piracy and armed robberies of vessels are steadily spilling over to the Bay of Bengal. On the basis of 2003 statistics, the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) has termed Bangladesh and India as the second and third most prone countries, respectively, to such attacks, with Indonesia leading the pack.
India has been actively participating in curbing the threat of piracy. New Delhi recently mooted a satellite communication network of littoral states for effective monitoring of ships’ passage across its maritime zone to forestall hijacking, piracy and transportation of WMD, wherein, a toll-free number enables ships to report their movement voluntarily.
The Andaman and Nicobar Islands are strategically located. Apart from having joint-patrolling with Indonesia in the Andaman Sea since 2002, India has also planned a joint naval exercise with Thailand to boost cooperation in curbing arms smuggling.
Making use of its islands as a base, India can play a significant role in protection of the Straits. Joint patrolling with the littorals would also provide the Indian Navy with greater operational experience in dealing with non-conventional threats that abound in India’s eastern seaboard, besides facilitating greater confidence building and cohesion with regional navies.
India’s security assistance in the straits could even include a ‘convoy protection scheme’ that is being contemplated by the littorals and for which the Indian Navy has acquired the experience through its successful 2002 mission of escorting US high-value ships through the Malacca Straits. Even the US would be amenable to India’s operational role in the straits since it is aware that by acting ‘solo’, its counter-terrorism efforts in Southeast Asia would be futile.
Piracy on the high seas has declined considerably since India ratified a regional agreement 18 months ago. This was pointed out in talks between Brig. Gen. Tay Lim Heng, chairman of the Regional Cooperation Agreement on Combating Piracy and Armed Robbery against ships in Asia (ReCAAP), and Vice Admiral Rusi Contractor, director general of the Indian Coast Guard and vice chairman of ReCAAP, in New Delhi early February 2008.
India acceded to ReCAAP on June 6, 2006. The agreement aims at enhancing cooperation amongst its 16 member countries, including most ASEAN members, China, Japan, South Korea, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. It enables the maritime forces to seize ships or aircraft involved in piracy and armed robbery besides information sharing, capacity building and cooperation for extradition and mutual legal assistance, a defence ministry statement Wednesday said. Among the ASEAN countries, only Malaysia and Indonesia are yet to ratify the treaty. ReCAAP achieved a distinction when it concluded an agreement with the International Maritime Organization December 2007.
by Dr. Arvind Kumar
