Somalia Piracy Tied to Lack of Water Supply

Piracy in the Gulf of Aden made worldwide headlines this past spring when U.S. President Barack Obama ordered Navy Seals to take out pirates who had captured a U.S. cargo ship. What was not often covered is one of the factors behind the crisis: lack of adequate water supply. Piracy is on the rise with more than 25 ships hijacked up through April of this year — a 300 percent increase since 2008. The hijacking of ships in the Gulf of Aden threatens an important trade route between Asia and Europe. For pirates operating in this vast shoreline, money is the sole objective. Yet Rohit Honawar, a research analyst at Strategic Foresight Group — a political think tank based in Mumbai, India - has pointed out that piracy is a symptom of the real crisis, which is a "systematic disintegration of the country owing to mismanagement and lack of resources...