Danica White hijacker among arrested pirates

BY HENRIK THOMSEN, RITZAU AND JØRGEN RUDBECK

Published 16.10.13 at 11:43

The arrest of the alleged leader of the group behind the hijacking will not be the last. Pirate leaders can no longer rest assured, says Catherine Ashton, Head of the European External Action Service.

A history of numerous hijackings

June 1st 2007: Freight ship "Danica White" from shipping company H. Folmer & Co is hijacked by Somali pirates in international waters east of the Somali coast. The ship was travelling from Dubai to Mombasa, Kenya. Five Danish seafarers were taken hostage.
August 22nd 2007: Hostages are released after being held by the pirates for 83 days, reportedly against a ransom of around USD 725,000.
According to Risk Intelligence Director Hans Tino Hansen, pirate kingpin Mohamed Abdi Hassan, better known as Afweyne or Big Mouth, was one of the pirates to organize the piracy profession.
Afweyne formed the Somali Marines during 2002/2003. The group also included two of the pirate leaders who later became famous as major pirate kingpins.

Pirate kingpin Mohamed Abdi Hassan, better known as Afweyne or Big Mouth, who was arrested as part of an elaborate undercover operation in Belgium in Saturday, was also the mastermind behind the hijacking of Danish coaster Danica White and the five Danish seafarers onboard that ship, says Director of international security firm Risk Intelligence, Hans Tino Hansen.

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"As founder and head of the group Somali Marines, a group that focuses purely on piracy, Afweyne is responsible for a long line of hijackings. From a Danish perspective, the hijacking of Danica White is the most interesting case," he tells Ritzau.

Last year, a UN report described Mohamed Abdi Hassan as "one of the most infamous and influential" pirate kingpins in Somalia.

First arrested leader, more to come

A sort of second-in-comman

Boyah and Mohamad Garad originally served as a kind second-in-command in the Somali Marines group.
The group hijacked a large number of commercial ships from 2004, the only brief respite being the second half of 2006, when the Islamic Courts ruled Somalia.
The group resumed its pirate activities when the Islamic Courts were deposed following the invasion of Ethiopia.
At times, the Somali authorities issued diplomatic papers to Afweyne, allowing the pirate leader to travel to India, among other places. He stayed in India in 2008 and early 2009.
During this period, the pirate kingpin's eldest son Abdulkadir Mohamed Afweyne assumed operational command of the pirate activities.

Source: International intelligence analysts Risk Intelligence

According to a spokesman for the Head of the European External Action Service, Catherina Ashton, the arrest marks an important step in the fight against piracy.

"While we have full respect for the principle of assumed innocence, we believe this arrest marks an important step in the fight against the pirates. It shows that authorities are now able to not just track the pirates, but also the alleged leaders of these ciminal networks," he tells Financial Times.

A Kenyen expert in maritime robberies at the Horn of Africa, Andrew Mwangura, confirmed to Ritzau in 2007 that Somali Marines was "most likely" the group behind the hijacking of Danica White, and other sources have since reached similar conclusions.

Danica White and its five Danish crew members were were hijacked on June 1st 2007 off the coast of Somalia. At first the pirates demanded USD 1.5 million, but the random was subsequently negotiated down to USD 723,000.

The coaster was released on August 20th 2007 and sailed to Djibouti, where Danish police technicians boarded the ship and secured both fingerprints and dna samples, so as to be able to apprehend the pirates later in case they turned up in Europe.

Son is also an active pirate

Afweyne's eldest son, Abdulkadir Mohamed Afweyne, is also active in piracy.

According to Director Hans Tino Hansen, Risk Intelligence, he was part of the investor group that kidnapped the six seafarers from Danish coaster Leopard, from carrier Shipcraft, on January 12, 2011.

The seafarers, including the two Danes Søren Lyngbjørn and Eddy Lopéz, where held captive for two years, three months, and 18 days before being released on April 30th this year, for a random of around USD 6.9 million.

The prospects of seeing his life portrayed in a documentary film lured the infamous pirate from Somalia to Brussels, where he was arrested together with his powerful co-conspirator, Mohamed Aden "Tiiceey."

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