U.S. Navy Office of Naval Intelligence Worldwide Threat to Shipping (WTS) Report 9 October - 8 November 2017 and HORN OF AFRICA/GULF OF GUINEA/ SOUTHEAST ASIA: Piracy Analysis and Warning Weekly (PAWW) Report for 2 - 8 November 2017

U.S. Navy Office of Naval Intelligence Worldwide Threat to Shipping (WTS) Report 9 October - 8 November 201... by lawofsea on Scribd

U.S. Navy Office of Naval Intelligence HORN OF AFRICA/GULF OF GUINEA/ SOUTHEAST ASIA: Piracy Analysis and W... by lawofsea on Scribd

U. S. Navy Office of Naval Intelligence Worldwide Threat to Shipping (WTS) Report 10 July - 9 August 2017 and HORN OF AFRICA/GULF OF GUINEA/ SOUTHEAST ASIA: Piracy Analysis and Warning Weekly (PAWW) Report for 3 - 9 August 2017

U. S. Navy Office of Naval Intelligence Worldwide Threat to Shipping (WTS) Report 10 July - 9 August 2017 by lawofsea on Scribd

U.S. Navy Office of Naval Intelligence HORN OF AFRICA/GULF OF GUINEA/ SOUTHEAST ASIA: Piracy Analysis and W... by lawofsea on Scribd

More about that "pirate" attack off Sri Lanka

Following up on this earlier post Pirates Off Sri Lanka, here's a clarifying report "Asylum seekers turn pirates, seize boat, attack crew off Sri Lanka":

The man rescued by Capt Petersen said he believed two colleagues had drowned, though Sri Lankan police said it was possible they were still aboard the Theja.

"He told us he was a fisherman from Sri Lanka and their fishing boat was attacked ... by some people who wanted their boat for emigration to Australia," Capt Petersen said.

"There were six people on this fishing boat. At least four of them were tied up and thrown into the sea.

Worth reading the whole thing.

More here, which has the great quote, ''There was some degree of criminality,'' he said.

It is also possible this is one of those things where the would-be immigrants were facing attack by the boat crew they thought they had a deal with (not an uncommon thing in history - just ask Vietnamese boat people) and defended themselves with some vigor.

I still don't think we have the full story.

Things must be tough in Sri Lanka to prompt this sort of desperate action.

UPDATE: A nice piece on a portion of the human smuggling racket to Australia from last year at The Telegraph's "The inside story of people smuggling to Australia"

Illegal Immigration from the Sea

From here:




Recent attempted landings reported here (8 people) and here (23 people),
More here.

UPDATE: A look at the U.S. Coast Guard and the illegal immigrant problem off the east coast of the U.S. here. Photo nearby is of a Yola used for people smuggling from the Dominican Republic.

Caribbean: People Smuggling

Headline reads "113 Haitians rescued, 2 dead, 85 missing off Turks and Caicos":

While authorities in the island fear that it was yet another smuggling operation gone array -- the tiny British-dependent island chain is a popular route among Haitian smugglers trying to get to South Florida from Haiti's north coast -- Johnson said, ``We are unsure if it's a smuggling venture.

``Right now, we are concentrating on locating an estimated 85 people that may still be missing,'' she said.

More info from Coast Guard News. And here. And from a Coast Guard Headquarters press release:

The U.S. Coast Guard is assisting Turks and Caicos authorities as they rescue up to 70 Haitian migrants who are stranded on a reef after their vessel capsized and sank.

It is estimated that 160 to 200 people may have been onboard the vessel when it capsized.

An HH60 Jayhawk helicopter assigned to Operation Bahamas Turks and Caicos (OPBAT) arrived on scene and hoisted four of the most injured migrants to the airport in Providenciales, Turks and Caicos for further transfer to medical personnel. Authorities from the Turks and Caicos used smallboats to rescue approximately 40 of the stranded migrants. Up to 20 migrants remain on the reef and are in the process of being rescued by Coast Guard and Turks and Caicos personnel. Three survivors have been located on an adjacent reef and four bodies have been located.

An HH-65 helicopter from Air Station Miami is on scene and searching for survivors in the water. The Coast Guard Cutter Valiant is en route. The reef is located approximately 2.3 miles southeast of West Caicos island.

A report on the allegedly "growing" problem of Haitian people smuggling to the Bahamas here:

More than two hundred Haitian economic refugees who came ashore in three separate groups last week are believed to be a part of a smuggling ring.
***
Officials believe that migrants are coming to The Bahamas because the economic situation is worsening in the region, particularly in northern Haiti.

UPDATE: A site on the Haitian "disaspora in the U.S." here offers up this map of the migration route:


UPDATE (7-29-09): The search continues with 67 still missing and 15 confirmed dead:

The boat, believed to be a shoddily built sail freighter 30 to 50 feet long, had been heading north from Haiti.

Survivors said the boat had departed carrying 160 people and had picked up 40 more before sinking, according to Coast Guard officials. All were believed to be migrants. Most of the missing passengers have probably drowned.

“We’re getting reports of 20-knot winds and six-foot seas out there,” said Petty Officer Jennifer Johnson, a Coast Guard spokeswoman in Miami. “If you put 200 people on a vessel that’s 30 or 40 feet, it’s bound for disaster.”

The sinking is potentially one of the worst disasters in years to strike Haitians fleeing the destitution of their country, the poorest in the Western Hemisphere. If no other survivors are found, the death toll will be the largest since at least 2007, when about 80 Haitians drowned or were eaten by sharks after their boat capsized near Turks and Caicos with 150 people aboard.

Video caption:

MIAMI - An HH-60 Jayhawk helicopter crew from Coast Guard Air Station Clearwater, Fla., deployed in support of Operation Bahamas Turks and Caicos, rescued a Haitian migrant Monday after his boat capsized and sank near West Caicos Island, Turks and Caicos Islands. The migrant was one of an estimated 200 people aboard the grossly overloaded vessel. Of the 200 aboard, 118 have been rescued and 15 have been recovered deceased. (USCG video)

Somalia: People Smuggling - Refugees Waiting to Cross Gulf of Aden

In an annual warning, UN agencies report up to 12,000 Somali refugees collecting near the port city of Bassaso on Somalia's Gulf of Aden coast awaiting transport in Fighting in Somalia forces more refugees across the Gulf of Aden:

According to our network of partners in Somalia, some 12,000 people have reached and found temporary shelter in the town of Bossaso in northern Somalia since 7 May. There, a majority of them are waiting for the first opportunity offered by smugglers to take the perilous journey across the Gulf. These internally displaced people (IDPs) are part of some 232,000 Somalis who have been forced to leave their homes since 7 May when the fighting between Al-Shabaab and Hisb-ul-Islam militia groups and government forces erupted in several districts of the Somali capital. Our partners in Bossaso report that the areas where potential migrants usually settle are getting more and more crowded and smugglers are already collecting bookings and cash from Somalis bound for Yemen. As the sea is already very dangerous because of the prevailing weather conditions, the majority of the people are expected to camp in Bossaso and wait for September, when winds are more favourable. In 2008, more than 50,000 new arrivals reached Yemen's shores – a 70% increase from 2007. The trend has continued during the first six months of 2009 with around 30,000 new arrivals – the total for the whole of 2007. It's a dangerous journey. More than 1,000 drowned en route in 2008 as they were thrown overboard or forced to disembark too far from the shore by unscrupulous smugglers. So far this year, almost 300 have died or gone missing.

Expect some bodies on the beaches when the migration continues.

Gulf of Aden: People Smugglers "Worse than the sharks"

What's lower than a Somali pirate on the scale of human scum? Let's try "people smugglers" -
From the United Nations refugee agency UNHCR Refugees Magazine:

The gangs operating in the anarchic stretch of sea separating Somalia from Yemen are notoriously and consistently brutal. During the first 11 months of 2007, more than 26,000 people – mostly Somalis and Ethiopians – each paid US$ 50-150 to make the crossing. During that period, at least 1,030 people died or were reported missing – almost double the 2006 total.

Many died atrocious deaths: stabbed and beaten by the smugglers; drowned after being dumped too far from the Yemen coast; or asphyxiated when too many people were crammed in a boat's hold. Some were 'luckier:' they were only raped, robbed, beaten or scalded by the engine. But they made it.
***
Yemen, which is one of world's poorest nations, is the only country in the Arabian Peninsula that has acceded to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention. For years it has kept its doors open and offered prima facie refugee status to all Somalis who make it across the Gulf of Aden (its generosity partly stemming from the fact that on some occasions in the past it was Somalia that provided a haven for Yemenis).


At the end of 2006, there were 95,000 refugees living in Yemen, 95 percent of whom were Somalis (other groups, such as Ethiopians, do not get automatic refugee status), and the numbers are rising – despite efforts on both sides of the Gulf of Aden to warn people of the dangers involved in dealing with smugglers.

Photos: (top) Yemeni soldiers guard a group of Ethiopian refugees beside the tiny fishing boat that brought them across the Gulf of Aden from Somalia.
UNHCR / A. Fazzina / 2007

(middle)A smuggler lights a cigarette as he watches over a group of refugees at a safe house in Bossaso. The former fisherman was drawn to people smuggling by the money – he makes around $5,000 a month ferrying people across the Gulf of Aden.
UNHCR / A. Fazzina / 2007

(bottom> A row of corpses line Al-Bedha beach at dawn. Following the arrival of a group of 365 refugees by boat the previous night, 34 corpses were washed ashore – either beaten to death by smugglers or drowned offshore.UNHCR / A. Fazzina / 2007

People smuggling- Crackdown in Puntland

Semi-autonomous part of Somalia takes on people smugglers according to this:

Somalia's self-declared autonomous region of Puntland has cracked down on people smugglers who have been using its ports as a springboard to get illegal migrants into the Gulf States, the head of police said.

The crackdown is intended to stop the smuggling of Ethiopian and Somali migrants to countries like Yemen and Saudi Arabia, a phenomenon that peaks at this time of the year.

"We have increased our patrols to deal with this problem before the [people smuggling] season starts in earnest," Gen Abdiaziz Said Gaamey, Puntland's police chief told IRIN from Bossaso, Puntland's commercial capital, on 6 September. "We have so far confiscated five boats and three trucks used by the smugglers to ferry the migrants."

The smuggling season usually runs from this month until December.

Sea crimes: Illegal migrants abandoned at sea, in need of help

Urgent help need to resuce 59 people abandoned at sea off Libya as they were attempting to reach Italy as set out here:

Coastguards in Falmouth, Cornwall, have launched a rescue operation to try to save 59 people abandoned on an inflatable boat off the coast of Libya.

An Ethiopian based in the UK appealed to them for help after receiving a call by satellite phone from the boat.

A Coastguard spokesman said the group, which includes four pregnant women, were cast adrift after being falsely told they were in Italian waters.

They were, in fact, only 64 miles from the north African coast.

The group are understood to have left north Africa two days ago, trying to get to Europe.

This is a truly awful episode in human trafficking
Simon Rabett, rescue centre co-ordinator

The spokesman said there were 15 women, seven children and 37 men on board.

"The craft is taking water and it has no engine," he said.

"The weather has worsened, they have no food or water.

"They had all their money taken from them."

Coastguards located the craft early on Wednesday and were working with both the Italian and Maltese authorities and with the British Embassy in Tripoli to get assistance.

UPDATE: For what it's worth, this Wikipedia article makes a distinction between "human trafficking" and "human smuggling" as does this U.S. Dept of State site:

Those who are smuggled have consented to be smuggled. Trafficking victims, according to the UNODC, "have either never consented or, if they initially consented, that consent has been rendered meaningless by the coercive, deceptive or abusive actions of the traffickers."

Another major difference, according to the UNODC, "is that smuggling ends with the arrival of the migrants at their destination, whereas trafficking involves the ongoing exploitation of the victims in some manner to generate illicit profits for the traffickers."

The United Nations' Protocol Against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air, Supplementing the United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime defines the "smuggling of migrants" as "the procurement, in order to obtain, directly or indirectly, a financial or other material benefit, of the illegal entry of a person into a State Party of which the person is not a national or permanent resident."

The Protocol mentioned above states, in part:

Smuggling by sea is not only dangerous for migrants, but is also a highly complex legal area for authorities, since crime at sea falls under international law. In October 1999, the Italian police, navy and coastguard tracked down a boat, which they suspected of smuggling, making its way from Albania to the Italian coastline. In an effort to escape authorities and lighten his load, the helmsman, an Albanian smuggler, threw his human cargo overboard. An estimated 100 migrants--Albanians, Turkish and Iraqi Kurds, Pakistanis and Kosovars--had been hiding in a wooden hold of the boat. Several victims were rescued, but many drowned. Every night Italian officials head for the water, capturing at least one boatload in human cargo, and sometimes even up to 20. While the trade in illegal commodities, such as drugs, cigarettes and weapons, is covered under international agreements, the trade in human cargo at sea and the treatment of victims is an area that is not yet regulated. As a result, a set of separate clauses was included in the Protocol to fight against the smuggling of migrants by sea.

The Protocol sets forth that Member States are required to cooperate in order to prevent and suppress the smuggling of migrants by sea, in accordance with international law. Measures include:

* When requested, helping to stop a vessel suspected of smuggling migrants;

* Confirming registry of a vessel strongly suspected of smuggling migrants and then requesting authorization from the flag State to take appropriate measures, such as boarding and searching the vessel;

In addition to the above, several safeguard clauses have been built in under Article 9 ensuring:

* That the migrants on board a vessel are treated safely and humanely;

* Using clearly marked aircraft and ships identifiable as being on government service in order to take actions at sea in cases of migrant smuggling.

Interpol site on human smuggling. The U.S. has a Human Smuggling and Trafficking Center. Exactly how "international law" is applied in such case is something I am researching.

UPDATE2: At least an abstract of an article on the impact of the Protocol says it might work, with a huge but:

Since this paper is written from a refugee protection perspective, it therefore examines who refugees are, why they resort to the use of people smugglers, and the dangers they face in doing so. It also considers the subsequent challenge for the international community to safeguard the rights of smuggled refugees and asylum seekers within the broader context of migration management, particularly in regard to the right of non-refoulement and access to protection. Here, two ‘challenges’ appear to have arisen: firstly the manner by which states differentiate between refugees and asylum seekers and undocumented migrants (or so-called ‘economic migrants’), who also resort to, or are exploited by, people smugglers and traffickers; and secondly, the procedures and methods states develop to prevent their asylum systems from being abused for immigration purposes. Accordingly, the Smuggling Protocol is examined to ascertain whether it can and will solve these aforementioned difficulties, and especially whether it adequately safeguards refugee rights. This paper concludes that whilst the Smuggling Protocol has the potential to do such, its application (and the extent of that application) ultimately depends on the will of the State Parties, and thus could amount to nothing more than a list of ‘good intentions’. (emphasis added)

UPDATE3: A defense of human smuggling on an abstract level here. I doubt the author would defend the pond scum who left these "smugglees" on the high seas.

UPDATE4: Nice look at the issues here.