The Pirate Offense Studies

The acts of Somalia piracy rose to its peak level during2007to2010since the end of World War II, bringing huge economic and human casualtiesand posing major threats to the world economy and international security.The international anti-piracy efforts under the UN system have producedphasal outcomes through joint escort by multilateral naval forces,heavy-hand crackdown, and severe punishment in the court of law in manystates. But all these efforts are short-term responses and can at bestcurb and keep acts of piracy at a relative low occurrence similar to thatof other international waters. Currently, pirates off the coast of Somaliaeither remain inactive and wait for their time to strike again, or aimto move to other areas of international water. Therefore, internationalanti-piracy campaigns are far from the end. In the absence of relevantinternational regulations and institutions, a large number of Somaliapirates have to be released before they are brought to justice,discounting and discrediting international commitment. To establish asustainable and effective way of tackling the Somalia piracy, theinternational community needs to act more proactively. In the short-term,it should contain and crack down on the acts of piracy according tointernational law through international cooperation. In the longer-term,it should make full use of the United Nations Convention on the Law ofthe Sea and the Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts againstthe Safety of Maritime Navigation to formulate new international conventions against acts of piracy. The new conventions should focus onclarifying the definition of piracy, jurisdiction over pirate’s acts,criminal conviction, judicial procedure, evidence collection, andimprove existing mechanisms for governance so as to address the Somaliapiracy and eradicate the root causes of acts of piracy.China is not only a big country of maritime trade, but also the victimof Somalia pirate activity. But our country still has not made the relatedlaw on pirate offense in the local penal code. Therefore, speeding uprelated lawmaking on pirate offense will maintain our country with abenefits at the sea trade and effectively undertake the obligation thatthe international convention stipulates. This article will put forwardour country’s pirate offense lawmaking thinking in drawing lessons fromother national lawmaking empirical foundation.