deep focus

Crew members of the Arctic Sea deplaning just outside Moscow (Russia TV)

I apologize if you’re getting tired of this story, but I find it endlessly fascinating. Piracy in Europe! (Pirates, outside of Africa and Asia?!) A resurgent Russia’s military might! For initiates, here’s a timeline from the AP of the events. So what’s happened since the last post?

Yesterday, the Russian spokesman for their defense ministry said that the pirates/hijackers (initially identified as Swedish police searching for drugs) had threatened to shoot the crew and sink the boat unless a $1.5 million ransom was paid. The boat’s insurer confirmed the story. The Russians arrested the 8 hijackers without firing a shot this week off of Cape Verde, three weeks after the ship had disappeared.

The AP article leaves off with a series of unanswered questions:

Why would the hijackers seize a small freighter carrying only about $2 million in timber? Were the hijackers actually seeking something of greater value, drugs, weapons or nuclear materials, perhaps? Why was it first reported that the hijackers had boarded the vessel in the Baltic Sea, bound and beaten the crew and then left?

The last question seems to have been resolved: the hijackers actually had stayed aboard, and had the crew report that eveything was fine when the ship traversed the straits of Dover.

The Financial Times threw a little more reporting into their story:

But the little information released by Russia so far has failed to convince many skeptics and speculation continued to swirl on Wednesday that the ship, which ostensibly was carrying €1.3m worth of timber, may have been carrying a secret cargo.

A former commander of the Estonian defence force, Tarmo Kouts, said in an article published Wednesday that the heavy contingent of naval vessels Russia sent to track down the ship indicated the Arctic Sea may have been involved in arms trafficking. “Only the presence of cruise missiles on board the ship can explain Russia’s strange behaviour in this whole story,” Mr Kouts said in Wednesday’s Postimees. Mr Kouts said the three battleships and one frigate Russia sent to find the ship was a much stronger naval unit than those involved in combating pirates off the coast of Somalia.

An executive at the Finland-based company that owned the vessel, Solchart, told the FT on Tuesday that “anything was possible”. Speaking on condition of anonymity, he said that a secret cargo may have been the target of the hijackers and may have been hidden on the ship when it anchored in Kaliningrad for repairs before it sailed for Finland where it was loaded with timber.

This may help explain the fairly extensive Russian involvement, especially in attacking the ship and freeing a crew, sailing under the flag of Malta. Granted, an Estonian talking about Russia would not necessarily want to show Russia in the kindest light. To throw some more speculative wood onto the fire, this may simply be about Russia showing its extended reach, flexing its naval muscles a bit. It’s not just the U.S. that can take down pirates, this seems to say. The FT piece ends with a more mundane answer:

One Russian businessman with knowledge of the shipping business said indications were growing that part of the ship’s 15 man crew may have conspired with the gang of eight men to seize the ship in effort to squeeze funds out of the ship’s owners.

Perfectly logical. And yet, the Kremlin has been so outspoken about the seizure. Russia is definitely milking this event for what its worth. Would I go so far as to say that this could be a PR stunt for Russian military might? No. But as the executive from the shipping company said, “anything is possible.”

(HT: Tom Dolan)