Saturday, October 04, 2008

Who Would Pay?

NYTimes reported It is one thing to haggle over a price for a pirate’s ransom. But it is apparently a whole other matter to figure out who, exactly, should pay it.
Why should anyone pay it? Kill the pirates, and bomb the bases on the Somali coast they operate out of.
On Friday, it seemed that discord among all the players — the shipping company, the shipowner, the insurance companies, government officials and relatives of the captured crew, not to mention the pirates — was slowing negotiations over how to free the arms-laden Ukrainian freighter that Somali pirates seized last week. The pirates want $20 million,
I'd like $20 million too, but I don't expect to get it, and the pirates should not expect anything but a bullet or a rope.
though people close to the negotiations have said they are being bartered down and will probably settle for $5 million.
And hos is that supposed to prevent future boats from being taken?
Still, it doesn’t seem as if anyone is rushing to pay up.

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