HORN OF AFRICA UPDATE: South Korean Naval Commandos Kill 8 Pirates, Free Hostages; Private Military Contractors Training Private Anti-Pirate Forces?

South Korean sailors from the Cheonghae Naval Unit conducting an antipiracy drill in 2009- Militaryphotos.net

Six days after the MV Samho Jewelry was boarded and seized by Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden, South Korean commandos stormed the cargo ship, killing 8 pirates and rescuing the 21 member crew. Taking part in multinational anti-piracy patrols in the region, the destroyer Choi Young was dispatched by South Korea to intercept the hijacked vessel.

The Samho Jewelry was carrying chemicals from the United Arab Emirates to Sri Lanka when the pirates attacked. A vessel from the same company shipping oil from Iraq to the USA- the Samho Dream- was hijacked by pirates last May and it's crew was released 217 days later only after a largest-of-its-kind ransom payment of US$9.5 million.

"Our special forces stormed the hijacked Samho Jewelry earlier today and freed all hostages," said Colonel Lee Bung-Woo, a spokesman for the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

"During the operation, our forces killed some Somali pirates and all of the hostages were confirmed alive," Lee told reporters on Friday. Another JSC spokesman said eight pirates were killed.

The military said Friday's rescue followed a brief gunbattle Tuesday, when the destroyer encountered pirates who had apparently left the South Korean freighter to try to seize a nearby Mongolian vessel.

The South Korean commandos aboard a speedboat and a Lynx helicopter were dispatched to rescue the Mongolian ship.

Tuesday's firefight left several pirates missing and believed killed although their bodies have not been found, spokesmen said. Three commandos were slightly hurt.

The rescue took place 800 miles off the northeastern coast of Somalia, according to the Joint Chiefs.

ELSEWHERE IN THE HORN OF AFRICA: Erik Prince, the founder of Blackwater USA, is reportedly backing an effort by South African Private Military Contractors to train 2000 Somalis for a land-based private army that would protect officials from Somalia's fragile Transitional government as well as combat pirates and the al-Shabaab Islamic militia.

Prince reportedly brokered the deal between officials in the United Arab Emirates and other Middle Eastern nations and South Africa's Saracen International to fill the security vacuum in the lawless region.

Presently an African Union peacekeeping force is propping up the internationally recognized Somali Transitional government that only controls parts of the capital city of Mogadishu. Last month, the AP reported that the Somalia project encompassed training a 1,000-man anti-piracy force in Somalia's northern semi-autonomous region of Puntland and presidential guards in Mogadishu, the ruined seaside capital. The story identified Saracen International, a private security company, as being involved, along with a former U.S. ambassador, Pierre Prosper; a senior ex-CIA officer, Michael Shanklin; and an unidentified Muslim donor nation. Prosper and Shanklin confirmed they were working as advisers to the Somali government.

Since then, AP has learned from officials and documents that Prince is involved and that a second 1,000-man anti-piracy force is planned for Mogadishu, where insurgents battle poorly equipped government forces.

This has some analysts fretting over what they call 'the privatization of war', which in a region that has been racked by famine, prolonged civil wars, lawlessness, piracy and terrorism for the last 20 years seems like a rather petty and abstract complaint.

I mean, really? Suddenly, employing some battle-hardened South Africans (or Brits, or Aussies, or Americans) with extensive military backgrounds to break the impasse and restore some sort of order is bad?

Worse than multiple civil wars dragging on for decades at a time that's killed millions?

Worse than multiple famines triggered by said civil wars and ethnic cleansing that's killed millions more?

Worse than rampant piracy that threatens to choke off the Red Sea to commercial maritime traffic to all nations?

Worse than yet another failed state playing host to yet another Islamic terror group that can operate with impunity?

I mean, it's not as though Saracen is usurping a Democratically elected government- there has essentially been no functioning central government in Somalia since 1991.

Food for thought.

PUNTLAND- The autonomous reigon of Puntland- where a number of pirate raids have been launched from- said it was breaking with Somalia's Transitional Federal Government 'until a legitimate Federal authority is in place in Mogadishu'.

The decision was made during a special cabinet meeting in the Puntland capital Garowe, said a government statement received by AFP in Nairobi.

It said the Mogadishu government "does not represent Puntland in international forums" and called on "the UN Political Office for Somalia (UNPOS) to reconsider its position and support for the TFG at the expense of other Somali stakeholders".

And it criticised "the lack of participation, consultation and representation of the Puntland Government during the 2008-2009 Djibouti Peace Process which led to the formation of the current Transitional Federal Government (TFG) of Somalia."

The statement also slammed "the marginalization of Puntland from the international community's initiatives and funding intended for the reconstruction and development of Somalia as a whole."

It said it "welcomes, supports and endorses the new U.S. Dual-Track Policy which is based on realities on the ground in Somalia" and called for a conference to speed up national reconciliation.

Unlike neighbouring Somaliland, Puntland, which was founded in 1998 by former transition president Abdullahi Yussuf Ahmed, did not secede from Somalia but has its own government bodies at Garowe.

While it's rumored that some government officials in Puntland take a cut of ransoms paid out to pirates, the Saracen project is reportedly using a pool of recruits from Puntland. Local reports also indicate that Saracen is aiding in the construction of a new Naval facility outside the coastal village of Bandar Siyada.

Photo- Guuleed

SOMALILAND- It could be that there's a country newer than South Sudan waiting in the wings. Somaliland declared its independence from the rest of Somalia during the 1991 Civil War and has managed to avoid the chaotic slide into lawlessness and anarchy that has characterized the rest of Somalia. It has managed to set up a functioning government and legals system, hold regularly scheduled elections and circulate its own currency- although for whatever reason the international community has been reluctant to recognize it as an independent state [I was actually made aware of Somaliland in the 1997 editon of Fielding's World's Most Dangerous Places; apparently Somaliland stood out because it wasn't as dengerous as the rest oF the country- NANESB!].

Surveys indicate that Somaliland holds considerable oil and mineral reserves, but because of it's unrecognized status, foreign companies are unable to extract those resources while Somaliland itself lacks the expertise on a local level to set up large scale drilling or mining operations. Presently, it's main source of income is exporting livestock, remittances from abroad and allowing Ethiopia to use the port of Berbera.

And they also view the rampant piracy in the region as one more problem that jeopardizes their bid for international recognition as a sovereign state. The de facto government in Somaliland has offered to put the port at Berbera at the disposal of the international navies that are patrolling the Red Sea and Indian Ocean as part of their stepped up campaign against Somali pirates as far back as 2008.

More recently, they have arrested and jailed pirates fleeing into Somaliland waters, handing out sentences of 15 years each. Last month, they arrested six Russian pilots violating territorial airspace and suspected of attempting to deliver military supplies to the Puntland reigon in defiance of a blanket arms embargo on all of Somalia (it is thought the supplies were destined for the Saracen project in Puntland). Puntland and Somaliland are involved in an ongoing border dispute as well. The Russians were released after being given a suspended sentence and fine at the end of December.

While far from perfect, this resilient and fairly orderly enclave along Somalia's northern coast could be what the international community needs to serve as a counterweight to the out of control piracy and al Shabaab militias that have taken over elsewhere in the Horn of Africa.

Blackwater-Hating Congressman Turns Out To Be Not Too Picky About Ride Out of 3rd World Capital In Middle of Coup

I came across this at LoppyD's place earlier tonight and couldn't resist digging into some yummy schadenfreude.

Representative Alan Grayson, who assured anyone who'd listen that the GOP healthcare plan is to 'just have you die', also has been drinking copious amounts of the Blackwater Hater-ade.

However, while on Congrssional business to the African nation of Niger this month, Grayson (D-FL) had to be spirited out of the country when that country's military staged a coup in the country's capital of Niamey. Rep. Grayson was spirited from the US Embassy to the airport and onto a plane that landed in neighboring Burkina-Faso. As it turned out, the plane was registered to his longtime nemesis, XE Services LLC- formerly Blackwater USA:

"The flight was arranged through the State Department," spokesman Todd Jurkowski said. "The congressman did not know, and frankly did not care, who owned the plane."
"The congressman does not deny that there is admirable work being done by some employees of private contractors," Jurkowski continued. "However, he stands by his criticism of companies who have been found to cheat the American people, defraud our government, and unnecessarily risk the lives of members of our military, all in the name of making a profit.

My my....I'm all atwitter over Grayson's sudden and convenient concern over the safety of our troops overseas. I wonder if he was as concerned when the late John Murtha accused the Haditha Marines or indiscrimately slaughtering a whole village in Iraq or how his ultimately baseless accusations would play on Al-Jazeera or Al-Manar TV.

As amusing as Grayson's predicament is, do not forget that his rhetoric targetting Blackwater/XE and other private military contractors has been enthusiastically and repeatedly used by groups like Al Qaeda and the Taliban when trying to deflect attention or blame away from their attacks on civilians.

BREAKING: Lazy, Inept Blogger Manages to Scoop The Washington Post

Not that I was trying very hard, mind you:

From the November 7th edition of the Washington Post website:

In Peshawar, State of Denial Over Market Attacks

PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN -- When terrorists last week blew up the Mina Bazaar, a market for women and children, they detonated a car bomb so powerful it left more than 100 people dead and 15 missing in a nightmarish scene of scattered limbs, charred corpses and victims trapped alive under mounds of debris

The bombing crossed a new line of callousness, uniting Peshawar in grief and fear and unleashing a tide of anger. But most of the outrage expressed by survivors, witnesses, religious leaders and other residents this week was not directed at Islamist extremist groups, whom the government has blamed for the attack, but at the countries many Pakistanis see as their true enemies: India, Israel and the United States

It seems that until pretty recently, Pakistanis in general had no problem with their Taliban proxies killing foreigners in Afghanistan or Kashmir. Now that they've spent the last month or so biting the hand that fed them in the most brutal, brazen and public manner possible, it borders on amazing to see their benefactors work overtime to try and deflect blame from their Talibani proxies.

Oh yes.....and the Talibans' first-ever benefactors (the Pakistani military and ISI Directorate) have nukes.

Whee!

Any wonder why I refer to Pakistan as the world's first failed nuclear state?

Failed Nuclear State Watch: Week of Oct 25th

Just days after a car bomb tore through a marketplace and killed 117 people in Peshawar, Pakistan the Taliban has done an abrupt about-face and denied any involvement in the attacks. Instead, they took a page out of American leftist groups like moveon.org or Code Pink's playbook and blamed private military contractors Blackwater USA for the bombing [caveat- link is from Iran's state-run Press TV, although several Pakistani news outlets are reporting the same story].

Certainly the Taliban wasn't shy about taking credit for earlier attacks this month. I have to wonder what was so beyond the pale about the October 28th attack that they carried out this week that they decided to try and deflect blame to Blackwater [now Xe Services LLC]. This week's attack did coincide with a visit from Secretary of State Clinton, but I think that was meant for the Taliban to show the Pakistani government how powerless they were by staging a mass csualty attack while a high-profile VIP was visiting Pakistan.

Meanwhile, the Pakistani Army has launched an offensive in South Waziristan, sending seven brigades (approximately 18,000 troops) to cordon off and search the reigon for Tehrik-e-Taliban militants.