Piracy post-tsunami

Piracy post-tsunami

Welcome though it would be, the marked decline in criminal activity in the piracy-plagued Malacca Straits after the tsunami cannot be attributed to altruistic factors alone.

They (pirates) are lying low because global attention is currently focused on the region as never before, and international relief and rescue operations have brought a vast number of vessels to the area. It is clearly unsafe for pirates to play their dirty games. But such conditions will be limited to the short term, and as normality returns, so will pirates. Make no mistake about it.

It is often forgotten in New Delhi that the Andaman & Nicobar islands are closer to Indonesia than the Indian mainland and, for example, unrest in Aceh has implications. It was tsunami- generated grief that proved that the Indian ocean, links not separates, should help to deal with pirates in a similar unified response. -- The Statesman, Calcutta