Also, more cargo vessels and oil tankers now have contingents of private armed security guards.

Mukundan said on the other side of Africa, the Gulf of Guinea is a pirate hot spot.

“Attacks in the Gulf of Guinea have increased, and what is very worrying is that they have seemed to have gone well and truly transnational. What last year was purely a Nigerian problem appears now to have spread to the neighboring countries of Benin and Togo; and since the end of September there has been an attack in Abidjan in the Ivory Coast where a tanker was hijacked. So this is a very worrying trend,” he said.

Right now, the Nigerian navy has borne the bulk of anti-piracy measures in the Gulf of Guinea.

The International Maritime bureau reported in Asia there were 51 pirate attacks in the first nine months of the year. But Mukundan said those incidents cannot compare to attacks off the African coasts, which are often very violent.

“In Asia, by and large, they are simply opportunist thefts from the ships at anchor or passing through their waters. There’s been a handful of cases where tugs towing barges have been attacked and the barges and tugs have been stolen,” he said.

Mukundan said having private security guards on board vessels is not the long-term solution. He said naval patrols must continue. If they’re removed, he added, pirate attacks off the Somali coast will rise dramatically.

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