Human Rights, when overdone as a inflexible dogma, encourage crime.

Somali pirates embrace capture as route to Europe

Pirates captured after attacking a Dutch vessel have gone on trial in the liberal Netherlands and at least two of them have declared their intention to stay on as residents.

Geert-Jan Knoops, an international criminal law attorney and professor at the Royal University of Utrecht, has suggested that the Dutch trial might encourage pirates to surrender just in order to seek a better life in Western countries. [ . . . ]

“Life is good here,” said one of the defendants, named Sayid, about his experience in a Dutch jail.
[ . . . ]

“My client feels safe here. His own village is dominated by poverty and sharia [Islamic law] but here he has good food and can play football and watch television. He thinks the lavatory in his cell is fantastic,” he said.

Mr Ausma has told the Somali that he will be considered for a residence permit after serving his sentence, expected to be a maximum of four years in prison.

“He intends to send for his wife and children as soon as he is released from prison. He knows he cannot easily be sent back to Somalia. He loves it here in the Netherlands,” Mr Ausma told the NRC Handelsblad newspaper.

Mr Ausma has also warned that ongoing piracy trials in the Netherlands, France and the United States will encourage pirates to commit crimes, for the purpose of being captured, rather than deterring attacks on Western flagged vessels.

“Anything is better than Somalia,” he said.

Prof Knoops has called for an international tribunal to deal with Somali pirates.

quoted from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/piracy/5350183/Somali-pirates-embrace-capture-as-route-to-Europe.html

Maybe the old time solution of sinking pirate ships and letting the pirates drown, or executing them on high seas would be a better service to humanity.  It would be more humane to worry about the safety of law abiding citizens, instead of worrying about the well being of violent dangerous criminals.

Interestingly, nobody worries much about the human rights violation of the average law abiding Somali citizen who was not captured by a foreign navy for being a criminal.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article3736239.ece

From The Sunday Times
April 13, 2008

Pirates can claim UK asylum

THE Royal Navy, once the scourge of brigands on the high seas, has been told by the Foreign Office not to detain pirates because doing so may breach their human rights.

Warships patrolling pirate-infested waters, such as those off Somalia, have been warned that there is also a risk that captured pirates could claim asylum in Britain.

The Foreign Office has advised that pirates sent back to Somalia could have their human rights breached because, under Islamic law, they face beheading for murder or having a hand chopped off for theft.

[ . . . ]

Britain is part of a coalition force that patrols piracy stricken areas and the guidance has troubled navy officers who believe they should have more freedom to intervene.

The guidance was sharply criticised by Julian Brazier MP, the Conservative shipping spokesman, who said: “These people commit horrendous offences. The solution is not to turn a blind eye but to turn them over to the local authorities. The convention on human rights quite rightly doesn’t cover the high seas. It’s a pathetic indictment of what our legal system has come to.”

http://deathby1000papercuts.com/2009/04/britain-hangs-out-welcome-mat-to-somali-pirates/

Britain Hangs Out Welcome Mat to Somali Pirates

A refreshing point of view follows:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article3736239.ece

Pirates must be hunted down and their vessels sunk on sight

Such ships must act promptly and ruthlessly, as piracy will spread unless it is stamped out. The Gulf of Aden is an exit from the Mediterranean, one of the world’s most important seas, crossed annually by thousands of ships. So our campaign must be ruthless and pitiless: pirate ships must be sunk on sight and the crews left to swim to safety, if it can be reached.

Many would complain about such tactics but, in my opinion, pirates have no rights – indeed, it will be vital to exclude human rights lawyers from the anti-piracy campaign. To bring any captives to Europe or America for trial would probably be to grant them their dearest wish, which is to secure entry to a new life in the First World.

Explosives and grenade launchers were discovered on the mother ship when Portuguese special forces boarded “with no exchange of fire”, Lt Cmdr Alexandre Santos Fernandes said.

“It was almost a kilogramme of high explosives. If used correctly it can open a hole in the hull of a ship and sink her,” Lt Cmdr Fernandes said.

“It is the first time we have spotted high explosives on board a pirate ship, normally they just stick to AK-47s and RPGs (grenades).”

The 19 pirate suspects were released because they had not attacked Portuguese property or citizens.

I really wonder if that is furthering human happiness, or if it contributes to more suffering, encouraging further piracy by the same criminals and by others encouraged by their impunity.

But as all dogmas, maybe they should be questioned.  Setting pirates free after expensive capture, does that not encourage piracy and create human suffering? Potential victims of the next attack of the same pirates? Victims of other pirates who join the profession, because they see that their biggest risk is spending a day on a war ship, getting fed and then sent back home? Everyone in the world who pays higher cost for higher insurance premiums due to piracy?

And if they get caught and actually sent to court? Due process means that a dozen witnesses get flown in from all over the world to their court date? If they don’t come, the criminals go free. What about the cost, financially, and simply loss of time for spending a week in Kenia to go to a hot court? Not to talk about the cost of locking criminals away for 10 years. Would not an investment in hospitals and schools be more humane then wasting HUGE amounts on jails?

I understand that these topics are complex, I don’t suggest easy solutions. But I am against unquestionable dogmas that can cause unsolvable problems.

http://www.utilitarian.net/singer/ delves further into similar issues

Pirates have attacked more than 80 boats this year alone, four times the number assaulted in 2003, according to the Kuala Lumpur-based International Maritime Bureau. They now hold at least 18 ships — including a Belgian tanker seized Saturday with 10 crew aboard — and over 310 crew hostage, according to an Associated Press count.

From http://latestnewsworldwide.blogspot.com/2009/04/nato-ships-helicopters-hunt-down-7.html