New Delhi: Even as India has been concentrating on trade and business through maritime, records indicate that 4,728 incidents of piracy, armed robbery, contraband smuggling, illegal and unregulated fishing and irregular human migration took place in the Indian Ocean region and the adjoining areas last year.
The data compiled by the Information Fusion Centre — Indian Ocean Region (IFC-IOR) stated that 161 piracy and armed robbery incidents took place in 2022, which has become a major cause of concern in the maritime sector. The incidents were, however, a slight decrease in comparison to 168 recorded in 2021. This drop is mainly attributed to the reduction of incidents recorded in the Gulf of Guinea region. The Centre recorded a monthly average of approximately 13 incidents in 2022 as compared to 14 incidents in 2021 and 22 incidents in 2020.
The IFC-IOR, hosted by the Indian Navy, was established by the Government of India in 2018 to address the need to promote collaboration for maritime safety and security. The Centre aims at strengthening maritime security in the region by building a common coherent maritime situation picture and acting as a maritime security information sharing hub. Since its inception, the Centre has established 67 linkages in 25 countries.
“The overall trends of piracy and armed robbery in the region declined in the past few years. In 2022, while only a few incidents were recorded by the Centre in which perpetrators boarded and hijacked vessels, and kidnapped crew members, most of the incidents in the year involved the theft of miscellaneous items, ship stores, engine spares and crew belongings,” the Centre said.
Sea theft was the most frequently reported type of incident in 2022, accounting for 40 per cent (64 incidents out of 161) of total incidents as compared to 45 incidents in 2021.
The IFC-IOR recorded a total of 811 instances in which contraband was seized by authorities in the region this year. Incidents of drug smuggling, however, saw a 15 per cent decrease this year and constituted 38 per cent of the total contraband incidents recorded by the Centre. These incidents have been grouped in the western and eastern Indian Ocean.
The Centre also noted that cyber security is an emerging concern for maritime security. It noted five specific cyber attacks in 2022. The most significant was the ransomware attack on the Jawaharlal Nehru Port Container Terminal in Mumbai in February, which affected the management information system and led to the temporary diversion of traffic to the other terminals in the port.
“The implication of a cyber-attack can range from loss of data, compromise of IT system, loss of connectivity, damage to infrastructure or even death,” the centre reported. A senior official from the Ministry of Shipping and Waterways told ETV Bharat that India is strategically located on the world’s shipping routes with a coastline of approximately 7,517 km.
“Approximately 95 per cent of the country’s trade by volume and 68 per cent by value is moved through maritime transport,” the official said. He said that the Multi-Agency Maritime Security Group (MAMSG) is a major endeavour by the Central government to ensure maritime security.
“The first meeting of the MAMSG took place in the recent past. It was decided in the meeting to hold security meetings regularly,” the official said. He said that governments of the Gulf of Guinea, East Africa, West Asia, South Asia and South East Asia have decided to meet regularly and share intelligence over security-related issues.
