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maritime piracy

“Crimgo” launches an assault on West African pirates

A Nigerian Navy team, trained by the British (credit: UK Ministry of Defence)

(BRUSSELS2) Faced with the persistence of maritime piracy in the Gulf of Guinea, the European Union has decided to launch a new project to strengthen " the safety and security of maritime routes between African Gulf countries. Commissioner Andris Piebalgs, in charge of Development, just announced it on Thursday (10 January). The region is currently suffering from a " lack of coordination between the coastguards and between the different regions “We estimate on the European side. Moreover there is no “still a common maritime training standard and the sharing of information between the countries concerned is insufficient”. An observation shared by most experts on the subject, according to our information.

A persistent risk of piracy

While maritime piracy tends to dry up in East Africa, it continues to exist and even to grow in the West. The latest incident is not far off. At the end of December, 3 Italian sailors from MV Asso Ventuno had been taken hostage off the coast of Nigeria, they were just released on Wednesday (January 9), officially "without paying ransom" (?:-). In Nigeria alone, some 98 acts of piracy, armed robbery at sea and maritime pollution were recorded between 2008 and 2012. All in a region that is of strategic interest to Europeans. According to economic data, the Gulf of Guinea “ currently accounts for 13% of oil imports and 6% of gas imports in the EU ».

Training and information network

The CRIMGO program - such is its name - as "critical maritime routes in the Gulf of Guinea" - will have two main lines of action: 1) the training of coastguards, 2) the establishment of a network allowing the exchange of information between countries and agencies in the region. It should be implemented in seven West African States (Benin, Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Nigeria, Sao Tome and Principe and Togo). And it will be carried out mainly by the ministerial services of several countries (France, Portugal, Spain, United Kingdom) and universities (Finland, Italy, Poland) (*). The budget released at European level is 4,5 million Euros. Launch: as of this month, DG Development announces.

Not a PeSDC mission

Comments : This is not a PeSDC mission (crisis management structures) - as in East Africa (EUCAP Nestor). But indeed, the release of funding, under the "critical roads" program (**), within the framework of the Instrument for Stability, led by DG Development and not by the European Diplomatic Service (EEAS) . This poses some coordination problems. And deserves an interrogation on the coherence of the European action in the matter as on their complementarity or their concomitance, or their... competition. I will come back!

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(*) Among the project partners are indeed France Expertise International (a public establishment dependent on the Quai d'Orsay) as well as the Directorate for Security and Defense Cooperation of the Quai, the Direção-Geral de Política do Mar (Portuguese), the Fundación Internacional y paralberoamérica de Administración y Políticas Públicas (Spanish ), the Foreign Office (British) as well as the Satakunta University of Applied Sciences (Finland), the International Maritime Safety Security Environment Academy (Italy) and the Szczecin Maritime University (Poland).

(**) The "critical maritime routes" program was launched in 2009 and focused its activities on Southeast Asia, the western Indian Ocean and the Gulf of Guinea. Its objective is to improve safety and security at sea and thus help to make shipping and shipping routes safer. In the long term, it aims to improve maritime governance. Its budget remains modest. Since its launch, €16 million have been allocated to these activities.

Nicolas Gros Verheyde

Chief editor of the B2 site. Graduated in European law from the University of Paris I Pantheon Sorbonne and listener to the 65th session of the IHEDN (Institut des Hautes Etudes de la Défense Nationale. Journalist since 1989, founded B2 - Bruxelles2 in 2008. EU/NATO correspondent in Brussels for Sud-Ouest (previously West-France and France-Soir).

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