PLANETDATA / MARITIME SECURITY NEWS
PlanetData - The Security News Network is a free news and information resource focused on maritime, global, corporate, cyber, homeland and aviation security, law enforcement and intelligence. PlanetData hosts timely and comprehensive content gathered from over 1,000 online sources, as well as from our editors, contributors and members. This newsletter entry carries a summary of PlanetData’s weekly maritime security roundup.
• Somalia: Pirate Attack Foiled, But Pirates Set Free
Sept 23, 2009 — The Australian navy foiled an apparent pirate attack on Sunday in the Gulf of Aden when the crew of the HMAS Toowoomba responded to an emergency call from the MV BBC Portugal, which was reporting that a boat carrying armed men was approaching at high speed.
The Australian sailors intercepted the boat of suspected pirates and confiscated a large cache of weapons. Unfortunately, as is the policy of the Australian navy, as well as most other navies, the gang of criminals was allowed to go free.
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http://www.planetdata.net/sites/maritime/news.php?story=26138
• Georgia: Russian Coastguard Arrives to Defend Abkhazia's Maritime Borders
Sept 22, 2009 — Earlier in the month we had a post about the potential for a renewed Georgia vs. Russia conflict brought on by escalating tensions over control of Abkhazia's Black Sea coastal area. Russia has vowed to help protect the breakaway region's maritime borders, while Georgia has vowed to block any unauthorized shipments to Abkhazia that it considers to be illegal.
So things became a bit more heated this week when, as RIA Novosti reports, part of the Russian coastguard contingent that the Kremlin will base out of Abkhazia's port of Ochamchira began arriving in the region. In response to this deployment, Georgia's Foreign Ministry said, "With its aggressive actions, Russia continues to pursue an annexationist policy regarding Georgia, this time by occupying the Abkhaz section of the internationally recognized Georgian offshore zone."
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• Puget Sound Radiological/Nuclear Detection Exercise This Week
Sept 22, 2009 — On Thursday (9/24) the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is holding a radiological and nuclear detection exercise in Washington's Puget Sound.
According to the U.S. Coast Guard, "representatives of participating agencies will discuss the exercise and how it was designed to develop and enhance maritime preventive radiological and nuclear detection and response capabilities. Demonstrations of several detection systems will be given on the dock and on law enforcement boats."
The event is being held at the U.S. Coast Guard Base Pier 36 in Seattle from 8:30 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. For more information, visit the Coast Guard website here.
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• Guinea-Bissau: Latin American Drug Cartels Use West Africa to Reach Europe
Sept 22, 2009 — CNN has an interesting, and longer than usual, article about how Latin American drug cartels are increasingly setting up shop in West African nations as a jumping off point to reach the lucrative European cocaine market. The narcotics are smuggled across the Atlantic in large volumes and then broken up into smaller shipments in countries like Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali and Mauritania before being smuggled into the EU.
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• Spain: Russian Investigation of MV Arctic Sea is Over
Sept 18, 2009 — Russian investigators say they are done inspecting the MV Arctic Sea which was supposedly hijacked by pirates in the Baltic Sea in July and held for nearly 2 weeks. It is being reported that the Russians plan to turn the ship over to Maltese authorities Friday (9/18), and take whatever evidence they've found back to Russia to use in the trial against the 8 alleged hijackers.
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