Newly-appointed International Maritime Organization (IMO) General
Secretary Koji Sekimizu vowed to reduce piracy cases worldwide so that
the world's 1.2 million strong force of seafarers, including 400,000
Filipinos, can go about their business in the high seas without fear of
being attacked by pirates.
Sekimizu, who started his four-year term last Jan. 1, said that he had appointed an able official to tackle this issue.
“Anti-piracy measures will receive a boost with the appointment of
Harmut Hesse as special representative of the Secretary-General for
Maritime Security and Anti-Piracy Programs," the IMO chief said.
“He (Hesse) will have responsibility for the implementation of the
Djibouti Code of Conduct and will also act as the IMO representative to
conferences and meetings dealing with piracy issues,” Sekimizu said.
Earlier, the IMO announced that piracy attacks worldwide were beginning to go down to its naval partners.
"Recent statistics show that the number of ships and seafarers held
captive by Somali pirates have reduced from a peak of 33 and 733 in
February 2011 to 13 and 265 respectively at the beginning of December
2011. The number of reported attacks has also declined from a high of 45
per month in January 2011 to 14 for the month of November 2011; and the
proportion of successful attacks has been cut from 20 per cent in
January 2011 to just seven per cent in November 2011," the maritime body
said.
The IMO points to the spread of best management practice guidance and
increased awareness by crews of how to access naval protection and
implement the recommended evasive and defensive measures, as well as the
use of onboard armed security teams and the continuing naval patrol
presence, as factors in the reduction of successful Somali pirate
attacks in 2011.
As this develops, Sekimizu announced a number of changes in the structure of IMO Secretariat “to improve delivery mechanism”.
The changes include the appointment of IMO Assistant
Secretary-General Andrew Winbow as the new director of Maritime Safety.
Winbow was with the IMO's Administrative Division prior to his new post.
While Jo-Espinosa-Ferrey of the Marine Environment Division has been
named head of the Administrative Division as its new director, while
Stefan Micallef now takes over as the new Marine Environment director.
Sekimizu has succeeded Efthimios E. Mitropoulos who ended his tour of
duty as IMO Secretary-General last Dec. 31, 2011, at the expiration of
his second four-year term. (PNA)
Seafarertimes