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Europe,Asia plundering somalia's rich maritime resources.

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By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)

2/22/2012

Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

Ships, having overfished their native lands, move to East African nations

 

The east African nation of Somalia is fighting a losing battle with the plundering of its rich maritime resources, a new report says. Having existed without a government for at least two decades, Somalia has been unable to cope with wayward ships from Asia and Europe that have moved on to its spacious coastline in order to illegally fish.

 

 

Three years of deployment of naval fleets from major world powers has failed to stamp out the modestly-equipped, ransom-seeking pirates off the Somali coastline.

 

 

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - "Having over-fished their home waters, these sophisticated factory ships are seeking catch in one of the world's richest remaining fishing zones," the report published by the New York-based Global Policy Forum says.

 

Three years of deployment of naval fleets from major world powers has failed to stamp out the modestly-equipped, ransom-seeking pirates.

 

"The foreign boats are illegal, unreported and unregulated - part of a growing international criminal fishing enterprise," it says.

 

Authored by Suzanne Dershowitz and James Paul, the report was released ahead of a high-level international conference on Somalia scheduled to take place in London.

 

"Crises like Somalia are not accidental and they can be solved, but as always in these cases, geo-strategic and economic interests are at stake, preventing sensible outcomes and actually deepening the crisis," James Paul says.

 

"Unfortunately, the African Union is not playing the constructive role that we might hope for and is working with the big powers to move forward with a militarized policy."

 

The United Nations working with the international community could easily address the illegal fishing and toxic dumping through the creation of a coast guard. This is a solution that would be far less expensive than the large foreign naval forces and much more appropriate as well, he said.

 

The nations could also create a truly strong worldwide regime to ban illegal fishing and toxic dumping.

 

"There is a plague of criminal activities of this kind that are stripping the world's oceans of all the major fish species and polluting the oceans with toxic wastes," Paul said.

 

Paul says that the international community must act quickly. "Now is the time to act, before every last fish has been hunted down, and every second Somali killed in the name of counter-terrorism," Paul declared.

 

The British government admits that the current foreign policy in Somalia is not succeeding.

 

"After 20 years of sliding backwards, Somalia needs a step-change in effort both from the international community, but also Somalia's political leaders," the report adds.

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