Examination of Witnesses (Question Numbers
40-57)
Rear Admiral Philip Jones, RN
12 FEBRUARY 2009
Q40 Lord Anderson of Swansea: It is probably
more DFID than FCO. I have visited Somaliland on several occasions
on governance missions. Is it true that none of these pirates
actually leave from Somaliland. It used to be the British Somaliland
with its capital in Hargeisa. Are we able, either as UK, given
our past connections, or as EU, prepared to train forces in Somaliland
to do this job of apprehending pirates?
Rear Admiral Jones: On the first question, my
Lord, I believe that to be the case. We obviously do not know
exactly the origin of where a pirate first left the Somali coast,
because very often they will cross the Gulf of Aden, hole up in
some quiet, secluded bay somewhere in the exposed coast of Yemen
and then come and look to attack ships in the north, so we do
not always know where they have originally come from, but we believe
that they come almost exclusively from the Puntland and Somalia
coast, not Somaliland.
Q41 Lord Anderson of Swansea: The Port
of Berbera could be used presumably?
Rear Admiral Jones: Yes, the Port of Berbera
has already been used as a conduit in which we put both World
Food Programme and also some World Food Programme ships have sailed
from Berbera to elsewhere in Somalia, so it is becoming a much
more stable area. In terms of how we might deal with them in future,
how we might look to do capacity building measures with Somaliland,
I think, my Lord Chairman, it may well be right to say that the
Minister will be a better man to ask that.
Q42 Chairman: You have already talked
a little bit about the Marine Security Centre and Djibouti as
well. Is there anything else in particular you think you would
want to tell the committee about that, or have we really covered
that in your own mind?
Rear Admiral Jones: The Maritime Security Centre
Horn of Africa is something I just wanted to stress a little bit
more, because we regard that not only as one of the huge success
stories of Atalanta, but we have almost 4,000 shipping companies
who have registered on that and we are also seeking to evolve
it now, to make it more agile and more usable, web-page access,
such that the shipping companies can use it more easily, but we
also see that as one of the enduring elements of Op Atalanta that
we eventually will seek to hand over once the operation ceases
to possibly a regional co-ordination centre as a method of building
security and stability in the region through the ability to control
pirates and be aware of merchant ship movements, and we are looking
to take that forward. That I think will be a significant element
of the legacy of Op Atalanta. On Djibouti, I think it will continue
to be a pivotal regional hub of all activity in support of Somalia.
I was there recently visiting some of my ships, visiting the logistics
support area and offering my thanks to both Djibouti forces and
French forces in Djibouti for the way they are supporting our
operations. While I was there, I was aware that the new government
of Somalia and the newly elected President were also there having
meetings; so Djibouti clearly plays a very pivotal role, supporting
both the military operations in the Gulf of Aden but also the
emerging structures of the transitional federal government in
Somalia, so I think that will be a crucial hub of activity for
a long time to come.
Chairman: Good.
Q43 Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean:
Admiral, you have told us that your mission is the deterrence
of piracy, although you have talked about the eradication of piracy
as well. You describe the difficulties about arresting suspected
pirates unless you have clear evidence that they have been engaged
in piracy, as opposed to being engaged in it the day before yesterday.
How difficult has that made it for you to arrest pirates? How
many pirates have you been able to arrest? I have this uncomfortable
feeling that it is great on the containment but then it pops up
somewhere else because the same guys just go somewhere else; they
have been able to hang on to some of their equipment and they
can re-emerge somewhere else because we have not actually been
able to capture them and take them off. Are there problems in
doing that over human rights and the way in which you then do
hand them over? Lord Hamilton was talking about blowing up their
ships, and then you said, yes, what do you do with them? What
do you do with them and to whom can you hand them over and still
be satisfied that their basic human rights are going to be well
looked after? We have greatest respect for our Chinese and Saudi
and Russian colleagues, but they do not necessarily have quite
the same attitude to human rights as we do, so it is quite a complicated
question about how you deal with that still be effective.
Rear Admiral Jones: It is, my Lady, and you
have touched on one of the most difficult areas of setting up
this operation today. There is, as yet, no pan-EU legal agreement
for the landing of detained pirates for subsequent prosecution
with any regional state. We do not have it for all EU ships, no
matter what Member State they come from. Some individual participating
Member States have those bilateral agreements. The UK, for example,
has one with Kenya. So if a UK ship in my force contains pirates
I know the route we will take in order to hopefully land them
for subsequent prosecution, but we are working very hard and EU
legal services in support of the EU Council in Brussels are almost
daily sending fresh teams out to negotiate with a whole range
of regional states looking for where the opportunities might be
to negotiate these arrangements. These are not easy to arrange,
because many of the regional states, while comfortable with the
bilateral legal arrangement for the landing of pirates, are nervous
with doing one with a whole organisation because they do not know
exactly what they might be signing up to, because a whole range
of countries might start using them. The coalition does not have
one, NATO did not have one, but we think we are getting close,
and that would really help, because you are absolutely right to
say that in some cases some of the Member States' ships, if they
detain pirates, will have to release them and at sea there is
no method by which they can land them anywhere for subsequent
prosecution and that is frustrating. That is clearly not an adequate
deterrent to pirates because, again back to the risk/reward balance,
they have a fairly strong sense that there is no risk of capture.
If they knew that every time they are caught by a warship they
will be landed, they will be prosecuted, they will be imprisoned,
I think the level of deterrence could drive up. So we are optimistic
that we are moving in the right direction here and a number of
fairly positive negotiations are underway with a range of regional
states, but, of course, as I am constantly reminded by the Member
States of the EU, we have to make sure that those arrangements
are conducted with regional states who have a policy for handling
those pirates that is in accordance with the European Convention
on Human Rights, and so they are nervous of arrangements with
regional states that, for example, might have capital punishment
as a potential sentence that they might commit the pirates to;
so that is another complicating factor in negotiations.
Q44 Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean:
How many has the EU operation arrested, detained over the course
of the last 12 months?
Rear Admiral Jones: EU ships have detained in
two separate operations, one involving the French ship and one
involving the German ship, about, I think, 15 to 20 pirates, but
of course that in itself highlighted the two different routes
we followed. The French have a bilateral arrangement for the landing
and prosecution of pirates.
Q45 Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean:
With whom?
Rear Admiral Jones: That was done under the
national operational command.
Q46 Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean:
But with whom?
Rear Admiral Jones: The French bilateral arrangement
is with the authorities in Puntland, but the ship opts out of
EU op-com to French national op-com to do that. The German ship
in my force also detained some pirates in a counter-piracy operation
and they were forced to release them at sea because there was
no method for the German ship to prosecute.
Q47 Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean:
Do you know what the Chinese or the Russians do?
Rear Admiral Jones: I do not, no. I am not aware
that they have detained any pirates yet. Again, it is possible
that we would not know that they had done so, depending on what
route they take to land them, but we have not become aware of
them detaining any yet.
Q48 Lord Inge: If we did detain some
of them, we presumably then have to provide people to go and give
evidence in the court, do we?
Rear Admiral Jones: We do, my Lord, and there
is a trial, I think, either still underway or has recently been
underway in Kenya of some of the pirates captured by a British
warship under NATO op-com last year and we have had to send witnesses
down to build the prosecution case of that trial.
Q49 Lord Inge: That must waste a lot
of time?
Rear Admiral Jones: We just have to factor in
the right structures to enable that to happen with minimum impact
on the operation itself, but if that is what it takes in order
to secure prosecution, then so be it.
Q50 Lord Inge: Do you know the results
of those trials?
Rear Admiral Jones: I do not believe that particular
one has concluded yet, but we are watching it carefully.
Lord Hamilton of Epsom: I think your
answer to Lord Inge has answered mine too. I was wondering whether
it was possible to cheat and whether you could actually transfer
the prisoners from the German ship to our ship, drive them down
to Mombassa and prosecute them?
Q51 Lord Inge: You would not imagine
this was an ex-minister speaking, would you!
Rear Admiral Jones: My Lord, your suggestion
is actually pretty sensible, because we have already started to
look at a tactic whereby a particular EU ship might end up deterring
and disrupting the pirate act, but without bringing the pirate
on board that ship they have not yet detained them, so if we then
have another ship nearby that can come in and join the action
and do the detention we may be able to follow exactly that route.
The problem, of course, as ever, will be a million square miles
of ocean, six EU ships: what is the prospect of having the right
EU ship available just over the horizon to come racing in? There
are some constraints, again entirely understandably, about the
length of time that we could detain a pirate at sea before landing
him to a place where the sense of his legal rights can be guaranteed.
We are under an obligation, if we detain them, to get them ashore
as quickly as possible.
Chairman: I think it is a very cunning
plan anyway.
Q52 Lord Anderson of Swansea: The Kenyan
ports, Mombassa, or whatever, are a very long distance away with
six ships. Has any consideration been given to seeking some sort
of deal with Somaliland, which is still not internationally recognised,
Somalia, providing a home port?
Rear Admiral Jones: We have not done that at
the operational headquarters, my Lord. There may well be consideration
with the EU legal services in Brussels to consider that option.
Clearly, operationally that would work for me because the distance
is much less, and if we were able to land detained pirates there
it would have much less impact on the availability of the ship
to return quickly to operations.
Q53 Lord Anderson of Swansea: It appears
to make sense.
Rear Admiral Jones: It is a long haul down to
Mombassa, as you say. When we plan a ship to go down there for
World Food Programme escort we have to plan several days just
for it to get there before it then does the operation, but I have
to be guided by legal expertise in Brussels as to whether that
is an appropriate negotiation to happen.
Q54 Chairman: I am aware of my time constraints,
but can I ask, at the other end of this, we have seen on our own
televisions when ransoms are paid and drops are made. Is there
a role for Atalanta after the point of collection of ransom, or
is that something that is just not possible?
Rear Admiral Jones: We have not been involved
in that yet, although we are aware that other warships have been.
In particular, the merchant vessel Faina, the Ukrainian ship with
a lot of arms on board, that was held for a very long time, was
effectively escorted away from Somali waters by the US warships
that had been close to it throughout the period of its detention
in order to make sure it safely got back on to the high seas and
on to its next port. We have not been asked to get involved in
that as yet, but we are aware that it is a request that could
come our way. Clearly there is a concern amongst some ship owners
and, indeed, the ports themselves that having been released by
one clan of pirates having paid the ransom, as you move away from
the coast you are potentially vulnerable to almost immediate recapture
by another clan of pirates, and that would be an extremely unwelcome
development in terms of international community perspective, so
if a request was made for us to offer a degree of security for
a ship moving away from the coast having been freed, we would
certainly look favourably at our ability to offer that potential.
Q55 Lord Hamilton of Epsom: Do you have
the capability with Royal Marines to actually take back a ship
that has been seized by pirates, like dropping in from helicopters
and that sort of thing?
Rear Admiral Jones: The capability that has
been put in to certainly Royal Navy ships operating in both Atalanta
and the coalition is at the highest end of boarding operations,
and particularly non-compliant boarding operations, of anything
we have ever deployed and a significant amount of capability has
been configured towards that. The precise way in which we would
consider how to do an operation like that is a consideration we
that will be taken elsewhere, but the capability is there to consider
that at the very least.
Q56 Lord Anderson of Swansea: Lessons
learnt so far in the course of the operations? If you were now
writing interim lessons learnt, what would be the main conclusions?
Rear Admiral Jones: I will have to do exactly
that actually. I have to do a mid-operation review to the EU Military
Committee in June, and that will form a large part of it. The
ability to establish an intelligence-led operation, I think, has
been the pivotal one. We were blessed at the start of Atalanta
by having a number of ships that joined the force having already
been in theatre. They were on national tasking or, indeed, working
as part of coalition or NATO tasking and they came to us with
a degree of awareness of operations in theatre. As each new ship
comes in, sometimes having deployed all the way from its home
port, it is taking a while to settle in and become familiar with
the patterns of life and then, again, the ability to use intelligence
to cue these valuable, priceless but small number of warships
on to where real pirate activity is taking place is absolutely
pivotal. So intelligence-led with a significantly enhanced degree
of surveillance capacity in order to best use the discrete asset
you have is probably the most significant lesson I have learned,
alongside co-ordination. Again, everyone who is involved in this
has a similar goal, and capturing the potential of all those participants
in a common goal of countering piracy is certainly one of the
huge lessons that have gone well.
Q57 Chairman: Admiral, thank you very
much indeed. I am aware that you have talked at quite a pace and
we have kept you here for a long time, but it has been an excellent
session, I think, and certainly as a committee we have learnt
a great deal; and I am sure we will want to congratulate you on
the work that you have done, particularly something that has not
been done before, and wish you every success in this particular
area.
Rear Admiral Jones: Thank you, my Lord. I appreciate
the opportunity very much.
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