Round Up Of Shipping and Logistics News Starts with a Correction to That RoRo/Container Ship Hijack

UK – WORLDWIDE – We are grateful to Melbourne based reader Scott McEwan who took us to task over our dismissal of the

on the RoRo/Container ship

pointing out that the stowaways from Nigeria, all four of whom were arrested after an SBS Helicopter operation in the Thames estuary and have now been further remanded in custody until they appear at Southend Magistrates Court on January 18, probably do comply with the term 'pirate' as defined by article 101 of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

Whilst the accepted dictionary definition of a pirate is one who robs, or attempts to rob, from a vessel at sea, the UNCLOS definition includes any illegal acts of violence or detention, or any act of depredation, committed for private ends by the crew or the passengers of a private ship or a private aircraft whether it occurs on the high seas or outside the jurisdiction of any State.

If however the offence occurred ‘within a State's internal waters, archipelagic waters and territorial sea’ it would then be considere....