Aid Group to Defend Somali Piracy Suspects, Ensure Fair Trials

Aug. 3 (Bloomberg) -- France-based Lawyers of the World, an international legal aid network, said it will defend 24 Somali piracy suspects held in Kenya, to boost the chances of a fair trial.

The hearing for the first group of 11 Somali men accused of piracy starts today in the port city of Mombasa, lawyer Avi Singh, a dual U.S.-Indian citizen coordinating the pro-bono defense effort, said in an interview yesterday in Mombasa. All 24 men claim they are not guilty and face up to life imprisonment if convicted.

Kenya, which borders Somalia, became a venue for piracy trials after signing prisoner-transfer deals this year with the U.S., the U.K. and the European Union in exchange for legal and logistical support. Those same countries are demanding that Kenya improve its own legal system.

“Foreign navies are dumping pirate suspects in Kenya,” said Singh. “They are the governments telling Kenya to get the judicial system right, then using it for a quick and dirty solution to piracy.”

UN Human Rights investigator Philip Alston authored a report published this year that alleged widespread judicial corruption in Kenya and called for a “root and branch” overhaul of the system.

The country’s courts are struggling to process a backlog of more than 80,000 cases, according to a government-appointed task force led by Justice William Ouko.

Fair Trial

The trials can’t be held in Somalia because the country doesn’t have a functioning judicial system after 18 years of civil war.

As a result, foreign navies have dropped off more than 110 suspected Somali pirates since 2006 at Kenya’s Mombasa port.

Resources provided to the prosecution and courts in Kenya have not been matched by funds to help suspected pirates pay for defense lawyers, summon witnesses, or collect evidence, said Singh.

He interviewed his 24 clients for the first time at Shimo La Tewa maximum-security prison near Mombasa yesterday. Some of them staged a 7-day hunger strike last month to protest their lack of legal representation, said Singh, citing prison records. Others claimed they were denied medical treatment, he added.

Lawyers of the World plans to set-up an office in Kenya to strengthen basic rights for detained piracy suspects, said Singh. That may include coordinating with relief agencies to deliver food, medicine and other supplies to inmates charged with piracy.

Attacks

Somalia has lacked a functioning central government since the ouster of Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991, and pirates are able to operate from its coast, which is almost as long as the U.S. eastern seaboard.

The number of piracy incidents off the coast of Somalia and the Gulf of Aden escalated to 130 in the first half of 2009 from 24 a year-earlier, according to the International Maritime Bureau. The monsoon season has slowed the pace of attacks in the area in recent months, according to IMB.

The EU, North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the U.S. have anti-piracy forces patrolling eastern Africa’s coastline to protect a sea link between Asia and Europe that carries a-tenth of the world’s trade.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in Kenya this week as part of a seven-nation tour of Africa, is scheduled to meet the president of Somalia’s transitional government Sheik Sharif Sheikh Ahmed.

To contact the reporter on this story: Sarah McGregor in Nairobi at smcgregor5@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Antony Sguazzin in Johannesburg at asguazzin@bloomberg.net.