PLANETDATA / MARITIME SECURITY NEWS
PlanetData - The Security News Network is a free news and information resource focused on maritime, global, corporate, cyber, homeland and aviation security, law enforcement and intelligence. PlanetData hosts timely and comprehensive content gathered from over 1,000 online sources, as well as from our editors, contributors and members. This newsletter entry carries a summary of PlanetData’s weekly maritime security roundup.
• Antarctica: Japan Whaling Ship and Protest Vessel Collide
Jan 6, 2010 — Anti-whaling extremists are accusing a Japanese whaling ship of ramming and destroying a protest vessel in Antarctic waters on Wednesday (1/6). Allegedly the Japanese security ship, the Shonan Maru 2, ran into the Sea Sheppard Conservation Society's Ady Gil, after the crew of the protest boat was unsuccessful in fouling the propeller of Japan's factory ship, the Nisshin Maru.
Other reports and video footage are countering the Sea Shepherd account of how the event took place.
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• Yemen: Yemen Navy Strikes Lucrative Deal to Protect Merchant Ships
Jan 5, 2010 — The private British-based security company, Gulf of Aden Group Transits (GoAGT), has contracted with the Yemeni navy to provide commercial vessels with armed escort ships through the pirate-infested waters of the Gulf of Aden. The price per vessel is $55,000.
GoAGT's CEO has said that not one ship protected by his company has been hijacked. However, the Yemeni government is apparently unaware its navy is part of the lucrative venture.
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• Somalia: Americans Warned to Avoid Somalia
Jan 4, 2010 — The U.S. State Department issued a new Travel Warning for Somalia on December 31, 2009 and continues to recommend that U.S. citizens avoid all travel to the unstable and violent Horn of Africa nation. The full Travel Warning can be found on the U.S. State Department website here, or in PlanetData's World News & Information section here.
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• Boston Mayor Wants to Block Yemeni LNG Shipments
Jan 1, 2010 — Boston Mayor Thomas Menino wants to block Yemeni tankers carrying liquefied nature gas (LNG) from arriving in the Port of Boston. Instead Menino wants the tankers to unload the LNG at offshore facilities. The Boston Globe reports that Menino and other city officials wish to ban these specific shipments "in light of the failed Christmas Day attempt by a Nigerian man, who trained in Yemen, to blow up a US airliner over Detroit." LNG tankers from other nations apparently are not of concern.
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