This is a little old and I am surprised I missed this. But better late than never. I think this speaks volumes as to how bad this piracy thing really is. We have all the navies of the world, expending millions of dollars every day in hunting pirates and trying to put a stop to this thing–and these pirates are more successful than ever. This is an example of how effective an Offense Industry can be. These pirates have an incentive to attack commerce, and despite all the threats to their operations, they continue to thrive.
Also, to clarify here, I despise these criminals. I do not think that hostage taking/killing/torturing or piracy itself is funny. If anything, I am laughing at our pathetic response to this scourge. I would like to cheer on the modern nations of the world in eradicating this problem, but it’s hard to do that when the pirates are this successful. Ridiculously successful matter of fact. They are achieving results with their ever evolving offense industry, and the rest of the modern world just falters. In this case, you just have to laugh at this one. –Matt
Somali pirates cut ransoms to clear hijacked ships
By Mohamed Ahmed and Abdi sheikh
Sunday March 13, 2011
Somali pirates said on Sunday they would lower some of their ransom demands to get a faster turnover of ships they hijack in the Indian Ocean.
Armed pirate gangs, who have made millions of dollars capturing ships as far south as the Seychelles and eastwards towards India, said they were holding too many vessels and needed a quicker handover to generate more income.
“I believe there is no excuse for taking high ransoms. At least each of our groups holds ships now,” pirate Hussein told Reuters from Hobyo on the Somalian coast. He said the pirates were holding more than 30 ships at the moment.