Maritime will build security

Michael Richardson The Straits Times Asia News Network/Singapore

When planes take off from Singapore to fly to other countries, they are tracked in the sky. Aircraft movements around the world are under constant surveillance, for safety and security. Satellite-based communications and intensified checks since al- Qaeda used hijacked passenger jets in September 2001 to attack the United States enable the relevant authorities to know the precise positions of nearly all planes in the air, where they are going, when they will arrive, who is on board and what cargo is being carried.

The same can't said for the more than 46,000 ships that sail the world's oceans. They are largely unchecked and untracked when they leave port. But this is changing and it could form the basis for real-time global surveillance of ships at sea.

A number of Asia-Pacific nations, including Singapore, are working with the U.S. to develop a maritime surveillance arrangement known as the Regional Maritime Security Initiative, or RMSI. It is designed to curb both security and criminal threats at sea, including piracy, trafficking in arms, humans and drugs, and the use of ships and cargo containers for terrorist purposes, or to spread weapons of mass destruction (WMD). These threats, by their nature, are transnational.

THE RMSI framework aims to improve intelligence sharing and law enforcement. It will monitor, identify and, if necessary, intercept vessels suspected of involvement in criminal, terrorist or WMD activity in national and international waters.

The head of the U.S. Pacific Command in Hawaii, Admiral Thomas Fargo, told a U.S. congressional panel last month: "Working first with other navies of the region, our approach is to assess and then provide detailed plans to build and synchronize inter-agency and international capacity to fight threats that use the maritime space to facilitate their illicit activity."

Adm Fargo said that the U.S. wants to harness available and emerging technologies to improve maritime security in the Asia- Pacific region. Following the Sept. 11 attacks on the U.S. which exposed a whole new degree of vulnerability in the global transport system, the International Maritime Organization (IMO) has made it mandatory for all ocean-going vessels of 300 gross tonnes or more to be equipped with an automatic identification system, or AIS, by the end of this year, at the latest.

This device forms part of a ship- and shore-based broadcast network, operating in the VHF (very high frequency) maritime band. The AIS automatically sends and receives ship information such as identity, position, course, speed, ship particulars and cargo information to and from other ships, suitably-equipped aircraft and the shore. Precise timing and positional information is integrated via satellite.

The AIS system can help ships avoid collisions, make navigation safer and improve traffic management. But it can also be used to make shipping more secure close to land. The VHF version to be generally applied this year is short-range, normally little more than 20 nautical miles.

However, the IMO, the United Nations specialized agency responsible for shipping safety, is developing a plan for long- range identification and tracking of ships and hopes to get governments to agree to the details in December. The technology has already been proven by the Inmarsat company that provides satellite communication services to ships, airlines and air traffic controllers around the world.

For example, Inmarsat's C satellite terminals -- which the IMO has approved as an appropriate system for long-range ship tracking -- are in wide use by national fisheries authorities around the world to monitor the activities of fishing boats operating in their exclusive economic zones that extend 200 nautical miles out from the coast.

An Inmarsat C terminal incorporates a global positioning system (GPS) receiver which uses signals from 24 satellites in the U.S. GPS constellation to determine an accurate position. This information, including time, speed and course, is automatically transmitted at timed intervals via Inmarsat's satellites and the nearest receiving station on land, to the fleet monitoring centre to ensure that boats are fishing where they are supposed to be and that no unauthorized vessels are in the zone. The Inmarsat C system covers the globe, with the exception of the extreme polar regions.

U.S. OFFICIALS say that the size, shape and force structure of potential RMSI activities are yet to be determined. The RMSI is in the preliminary planning phase but is evidently open to a wide array of nations in the Asia-Pacific region, including China.

Initial discussions among interested states are scheduled to take place over the next few months. The first related activities are expected late this year. However, it is likely to take several years to shape the RMSI into a full-fledged regional partnership.

Adm Fargo said the U.S. believed an architecture was needed that would "allow us to share information and share intelligence, that puts standing operating procedures in place with the countries of the region, such that we can take effective action against this illicit activity".

The IMO has cautioned that while long-range identification and tracking of ships at sea could enhance maritime and coastal state security, the system could also be misused "as an aid to ship targeting" by military forces.

Given the level of mistrust of U.S. intentions in some countries of South-east Asia, especially in Muslim-majority Indonesia and Malaysia, Adm Fargo may have difficulty gaining universal acceptance for the RMSI.

For example, only Singapore among the 10 Asean members has so far agreed publicly to participate in the U.S.-sponsored Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) to halt the trade in weapons of mass destruction at sea, on land and in the air, although Adm Fargo said that India had recently indicated it would like to be part of PSI. Other Asia-Pacific members of PSI include the U.S., Canada, Japan and Australia. Most of the remaining participants are from Europe.

Still, Adm Fargo said that the RMSI concept had been well received by America's Asia-Pacific friends and allies, including Singapore which was going "to help us with this". The U.S. expected "a very broad range of support", he told the congressional panel. "I think you'll find that all of the countries in the region have an equity here and a means to make a contribution, however modest."

U.S. officials say that each country deciding to participate in the RMSI will define how much, if any, of its activity takes place within national waters. They also emphasize that RMSI operations on the high seas and in international shipping straits will observe international law.

The ultimate goal is to coordinate regional maritime security capabilities to make the sea more secure and create an environment hostile to terrorist and other criminal activities.

The writer is a visiting senior research fellow at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore. This is a personal comment.