1、 April 16,2009 SOMALI PIRACY:NOT JUST A NAVAL PROBLEM By Martin Murphy THE CONTINUITY OF PIRACY The hijacking of the 17,000 ton container ship Maersk Alabama off the Indian Ocean coast of Somalia on April 8th,2009 was the first occasion when a US-flagged ship with a US crew had been captured by Soma
2、li pirates.If this had been an ordinary ship the expectation would have been that the ship and its crew would have been held for months beyond hope of rescue or retaliation waiting for a substantial ransom to be paid.Thanks to the effort that Maersk Lines had put into planning for such an eventualit
3、y,the courage and determination of the American crew in recapturing their ship,and the accuracy of the sharpshooters firing from the moving deck of the USS Bainbridge who killed three of the pirates holding the ships captain,Richard Phillips,in a lifeboat,this was not an ordinary hijacking.Instead,i
4、t was one of the shortest ever recorded.This incident was but one in a long history of predation off the coast of this unfortunate country where poor people are ill served by poor government.It presents the Obama administration with the opportunity to place the question of Somalias future much close
