(Repeats story first moved July 17, text unchanged)
* Report says pirate leader given Somali diplomatic passport
* Somali president says passport 'inducement' to stop piracy
* Report cites legal hurdles to prosecuting pirate kingpins
* Somali piracy attacks have declined amid tougher response
NAIROBI, July 19 (Reuters) - Somalia's president has shielded a top pirate
leader from arrest by issuing him a diplomatic passport, according to a
United Nations investigation which criticises the "climate of impunity"
enjoyed by pirate kingpins in Somalia and abroad.
The U.N. Monitoring Group on Somalia said in a report to the Security
Council, seen by Reuters, that senior pirate leaders were benefitting from
high level protection from Somali authorities and were not being
sufficiently targeted for arrest or sanction by international authorities.
The Group said it had obtained evidence a diplomatic passport had been
provided "with the authorization of Somali President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh
Ahmed" to pirate leader Mohamed Abdi Hassan "Afweyne", who presented it to
authorities in Malaysia on a trip there in April.
Questioned by Malaysian immigration, Afweyne provided a document issued by
the Somali presidency stating he was involved in counter-piracy activities,
the report said. It said that Somalia's President Ahmed had told the Group
the passport was "one of several inducements" for Afweyne aimed at obtaining
the dismantling of his pirate network.
In a July 12 letter to the Chairman of the Security Council's Sanctions
Committee, obtained by Reuters, Ahmed called the contents of the Monitoring
Group's report "one-sided".
The letter said the principal author of the U.N. report, whom it did not
name, "seems hell bent on soiling the good names of private members of the
Somali people by throwing at them unsubstantiated allegations".
Somali government officials in Mogadishu could not be reached for comment.
The U.N. report has also riled the authorities in the semi-autonomous region
of Puntland, who are criticised for failing to arrest well-known senior
pirate leaders, in spite of a counter-piracy campaign that has reportedly
resulted in the arrest of hundreds of low-level pirates.
The report said that only one Puntland based pirate leader, Abshir Boyah,
had been arrested by the Puntland authorities but said his jail sentence of
only five years contrasted sharply with terms of up to 20 years given to
junior pirate figures.
Successful Somali pirate hijackings have been declining steadily since 2010,
partly the result of intensive international naval operations and the use of
private security on maritime vessels, but pirate leaders are adapting and
diversifying into new businesses, the U.N. report said.
Confirming this trend, the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) said on
Monday that tougher action by international navies and the use of private
armed guards on ships have more than halved the number of Somali pirate
attacks in the first half of 2012.
PIRATE CHIEFS ESCAPING PROSECUTION
Last year, Somali piracy in the busy shipping lanes of the Gulf of Aden and
the northwestern Indian Ocean netted $160 million, and cost the world
economy some $7 billion, according to the American One Earth Future
foundation.
The U.N. report said pirate leaders are now increasingly involved in
land-based kidnap for ransom of foreign tourists and aid workers in northern
Kenya and Somalia, as well as selling services as counter-piracy experts and
consultants in ransom negotiations, and exploring "new types of criminal
activity".
"This evolution of the piracy business model is being driven largely by
members of the Somali diaspora, whose foreign language skills and bank
accounts are all valuable assets," it said.
U.N. officials say the Monitoring Group has submitted two confidential cases
to the Security Council documenting the flow of piracy proceeds via
international accounts and singling out a Somali businessman with British
citizenship who is part of a piracy ring but who also runs a counter-piracy
business.
The Group said that in spite of three international task forces and efforts
by a dozen national governments in maritime counter-piracy efforts, serious
legal obstacles remain that "impede the prosecution and sanctioning of
pirate leaders and kingpins".
Out of 125 registered hijacking cases since December 2008 which have come
under the jurisdiction of 83 different countries, not more than 10
governments have actually embarked on broader investigations into Somali
pirate networks, the report said.
"As a result, the international community is investing enormous resources to
pursue and punish those at the bottom of the piracy pyramid ... while
virtually guaranteeing impunity for those at the top of the piracy pyramid
who bear the greatest responsibility and profit the most," it said.
UK BLOCK ON TARGETED SANCTIONS
Confusion over whether ransom payments and drop-offs of ransoms by private
security companies constitute illegal activity has also prompted Britain to
block the U.N. Security Council from applying financial sanctions against
senior pirate leaders since 2010, the report said.
With pirate leaders left untouched by U.N. sanctions, payments to them would
not be considered illegal and therefore private security companies could pay
out ransom fees without fear of violating sanctions, sources at the U.N.
said.
The British blocking of Security Council proposals to designate senior
Somali prirate leaders for targeted sanctions was "apparently at the behest
of powerful domestic interests in shipping, crisis and risk management
consultancies, maritime law and insurance and private maritime security
companies who indirectly derive significant profits from the Somali piracy
phenomenon," the report said.
Asked for comment, a Foreign Office spokesperson in London told Reuters the
British government maintained a clear policy of not making or facilitating
"substantive concessions to hostage takers, including the payment of
ransoms".
The spokesperson said Britain had since April 2010 maintained "a technical
hold" on proposals in the U.N. Sanctions Committee to designate pirate
leaders for sanctions "as it is necessary to better understand the potential
unintended consequences of using Sanctions, which include implications for
the families of U.K. nationals captured by pirates".
British Prime Minister David Cameron had set up a task force to look into
piracy kidnap for ransom in more detail, including the option of U.N.
sanctions. The task force force would make recommendations by the end of the
year, the Foreign Office said.
The U.N. report said the current situation had discouraged private security
companies from sharing information on who they had paid money to, putting a
brake on international investigations into piracy.
The Monitoring Group has asked the Security Council to explicitly clarify
that ransom payments to Somali pirates could not be considered an offence
that would be sanctioned.
Such a move would allow counter-piracy businesses in the U.K. to share
information on ransom payments they make, without the fear those payments
could expose them to future prosecutions, the report said.
The Foreign Office spokesperson said Britain was working with international
partners to establish a Regional Anti-Piracy Prosecution and Intelligence
Coordination Centre (RAPPICC) in the Seychelles, which would target pirate
kingpins. (Additional reporting by Nairobi bureau and Matthew Falloon in
London; Editing by Pascal Fletcher and Louise Ireland)
C Thomson Reuters 2012 All rights reserved
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Received on Thu Jul 19 2012 - 18:21:00 EDT
