Exclusive: Somali Pirates' Homemade Hijacking Video

As U.S. Navy ships track pirates holding an American captain hostage near the Horn of Africa, a source with well-placed contacts with pirate groups in Somalia has released an exclusive video to Wired.com from an earlier hijacking. It offers a rare, first-hand glimpse into the workings of the outlaw groups.The 10 minute 42 second video, taken by the pirates themselves, is both oddly intimate yet strangely banal. It takes place aboard the Yasa Neslihan, a vessel manned by a crew of 20 Turks captured by Pirates of Somalia,on October 29, 2008. The vessel and crew were released unharmed on Jan. 6, 2009, after a ransom was paid."There are many videos like this," the source told Wired magazine contributing editor Scott Carney, who obtained the video. "They make this video before they collect the ransom and leave the ship." Charo Tsuma, a spokesman for the East African Seafarers Assistance Program, a piracy-monitoring and welfare program, reached by phone from Kenya, confirmed that pirates often document their captures on video."They make videos to show the owners that they have the ship and that it is still intact," he said. "The pirates are normally very well networked." The clip comes as U.S. naval forces seek to free Capt. Richard Phillips, who was taken hostage Wednesday when four Somali pirates commandeered the U.S.-flagged container ship Maersk Alabama. The crew subsequently regained control of the vessel, but the pirates escaped with Phillips to a lifeboat.The situation remains tense following a failed escape attempt Friday, and a French rescue of a different hijacked ship that left one hostage and two pirates dead, according to The New York Times. The homemade pirate video reveals what appears to be a very lax treatment of hostages, who are seen walking and standing unrestrained inside the ship's cabins.Voices at the beginning of the clip can be heard speaking Somali saying, "We are filming the ship now, and the crew is under our control," according to a translation provided by the source. The video mostly includes long and uneventful clips of the interior and exterior of the vessel, and at one point shows a collection of guns and ammunition. The videographer appears to be carrying an AK-47, as revealed briefly at one point by his shadow. The video is accompanied by a sound track of popular Somali music blaring from the ship's PA system. Carney is currently writing a feature on Somali pirates for a future issue of Wired. "It's going to be about the Freakonomics of piracy," he said
Wired.com news editor Leander Kahney contributed to this report.
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SOMALIA PIRACY UPDATE 10 APRIL 2009, 0600Z
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