The Royal Netherlands Marechaussee is participating in a new German-Dutch investigation team set up to combat piracy in Somali waters. The establishment of this team was announced by the National Public Prosecutor’s Office on 17 November 2011.
The team will focus primarily on identifying the organisers, financiers and negotiators involved in hijacking merchant shipping. In general, the ships and their crews are only released after many months of negotiations between ship owners and pirates and after payment of ransoms amounting to millions of dollars. The investigation team will also try to discover where this money goes.
The Joint Investigation Team is an initiative of the Dutch National Public Prosecutor’s Office and the German Public Prosecutor’s Office in Osnabrück. In addition, the National Criminal Investigation Service, the State Investigation Bureau of Lower Saxony, the Federal Investigation Bureau in Berlin, Eurojust and Europol are also taking part. Last week, representatives from the Dutch National Public Prosecutor’s Office, the Public Prosecutor’s Office in Osnabrück and Eurojust signed the cooperation agreement. The joint investigation team has been set up provisionally for one year.
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World Maritime News Staff, November 24, 2011; Image: Defensie