Somali pirate catch-and-release?

Catching pirates off the coast of Africa is hard, but actually proving that they are pirates is harder still.

That is what the US Navy is finding out in the waters off Somalia. Recently the Navy caught nine men they claimed were about to attack an Indian-owned cargo ship. The Navy took the nine into custody and sank their boats. They then turned the nine suspected pirates over to officials in the self-governing region of Puntland in northern Somalia.

It all sounds good so far, except that the Navy has an agreement to put suspected pirates on trial in neighboring Kenya, a necessary step since along with not having a functioning national government, Somalia also doesn’t have a working legal system. But it seems like the Navy was worried it couldn’t actually prove the nine men were pirates in a Kenyan court, so they turned them over to the officials in Puntland, even though suspected pirates turned over to the Puntland authorities have a habit of winding up a-pirating again in short order.

Meanwhile it’s come out that the ransom paid for the release of the Faina, the Ukrainian-owned cargo ship with the load of Soviet-era tanks aboard, was put up by Ukrainian businessman and philanthropist Viktor Pinchuk, who said that he felt ‘obligated’ to help his countrymen.