For those who don’t know, the Animal Liberation Front and the Earth Liberation Front are eco-terrorist organizations who often sabotage and destroy private property to further their cause. Sea Shepherd is another group recently in the news for similar activities.
My question is this, from my cursory reading of international law as it applies to the sea and specifically piracy; certain actions of these groups falls within the accepted definition of piracy.
Now, my understanding is that Pirates are designated : “Those committing thefts on the high seas, inhibiting trade, and endangering maritime communication are considered by sovereign states to be hostis humani generis (enemies of humanity).[34]” They have all at one time or another committed all of these acts.
So what is to stop legal, law abiding trade vessels from calling in the local coast guard to pick up the pirates, and scuttling the pirate vessel to protect themselves? Just unwillingness to cause a complicated legal fuss; or is there some deeper law I’m not comprehending?
I don’t understand why some of these ship and installations that come under attack by such groups don’t have some sort of weapons on hand to strongly discourage most of these actions.
No, they also tangle up props, throw acid on deck, and vandalize equipment when they can get away with it.
Agreement to whaling treaties is voluntary, and nations can pull out when and if they like. I don’t want this to devolve into a GD about the ethics of whaling though.
Like everyone else, they’re “innocent until proven guilty”. When there are good evidence against them (and sometimes when the evidence is poor), they get taken to court.
Interesting, and good for the Canadians! I’m curious though as to whether the trade vessels themselves can undertake direct action, or whether they are subject to requesting the goodwill of the closest nation’s coast guard? If they can, why don’t they do so?
Most of those on the receiving end of such tactics don’t want to make martyrs out of the activists by responding too heavy-handedly. The French took a PR bath when their Clouseau-esque secret agents bombed the Greenpeace vessel Rainbow Warrior in New Zealand in the mid-'80s and killed a guy.
I suppose this makes a certain amount of sense, but Greenpeace isn’t as blatantly criminal as Sea Shepherd, nor would the defending vessel be governmental, but private.
I believe there was a similar debate in Britain, during the sixties when plane hijackings first became big news (at the time, on paper at least, Piracy and Treason were still capital offenses in the UK). The conclusion was, no, its not piracy.
Of course IMHO seeing as current terrorism legislation is not exactly a slap on the wrist, I’m not sure why this would even be needed. You already have cases where some dumb-ass who torched a Humvee is classified as a “terrorist” and hence getting a stiffer sentence that some murders or rapists.
Also we may be getting into GD territory here, but I don’t see the equilance between the likes of Greenpeace, who are a perfect legal respectable organization who practice the legitimate peaceful protests. And ALF/ELF who are a out and out terrorist crazees.
If you take on a group that is skilled in gaining the sympathy of the media, you may win, but it could be a pyrrhic victory. This is especially true if you are doing something legal that happens to be unpopular in much of the world, such as whaling. The US threatened sanctions against Japan for lodging an objection against the commercial whaling moratorium, and something similar might happen if Japan encouraged its whalers to use violence against groups like Sea Shepherd.
That doesn’t mean that the pirates aren’t entitled to the normal protections of the criminal law, such as the presumption of innocence and the onus of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. It just means that the ship that the country is registered with will not object to the capture of the ship in international waters, which is normally a breach of international law.
Google “greenpeace members” and “arrested”.
Someone certainly thinks they are.
We probably ought to note that some consider greenpeace criminal and some don’t, and then make a Pit of GD thread of the issue if we’re so inclined.
This is what I was referring to. I wasn’t suggesting that we hang the lot of 'em as examples, but I am curious as to why private entities aren’t taking more aggressive steps in protecting their investments. If you can capture the pirates and their vessels under this protection it would certainly be cheaper to hire a small security crew to do so rather than buying new nets, props, and repair extensive damage to their ships. I should think that after a few of their boats are impounded or scuttled, they would have a much harder time securing the funds to continue their activities. It would be fairly simple to have someone on board video the criminal activities and radio in a plan of action to the closest local coast guard; arranging for pickup of pirates, and vessel if it is still sea-worthy. Donations would probably flood in briefly, but drop off as sharply as they continue to lose their vessels.
Might I submit that they don’t take greater security measures for the same reason that we didn’t slap 60 marines at the front of all of the planes involved in the whole September 11th mess?
Lightning strikes more often than eco-terror pirates…