Since early April this, Somalia pirates have been seizing vessels on the East African coast.

Maritime piracy, according to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) of 1982, consists of any criminal acts of violence, detention, or depredation committed for private ends by the crew or the passengers of a private ship or aircraft that is directed on the high seas against another ship, aircraft, or against persons or property onboard a ship or aircraft. Piracy is the act of boarding any vessel with intent to commit theft or any other crime, and with an intent or capacity to use force in furtherance of that act.

In order to distinguish  it from simple hijacking, a piracy crime requires that two vessels be involved in the incident. The second requirement is that the crime has been undertaken for private, not political purposes.

General categories of pirates
The first type of pirate is your standard issue low-life criminal. These are scum who find it more expedient to just steal your finger, instead of taking the time to remove your ring. The second pirate type is a more sophisticated organized crime group such as the five gangs thought to control a significant percentage of piracy in Southeast Asia or one of the several triads believed to control this crime in China. The third and perhaps the most troubling type  is the 'semi official military pirate' examples of which has been seen in China, Indonesia, Somalia and elsewhere.

How do pirates do it?
There are essentially three types of pirate attacks. The most common type of attack is where pirates board the merchant vessel, rob the crew and escape.  The second type of pirate attack is a more ambitious one where pirates not only rob the crew but will also steal the cargo. While simple robbery crimes, boats normally employ pirate crews of 6 to 7 men, gangs of 70 or more may fall upon a merchant vessel when it is cargo that they are after. Unless the pirate gang is very sophisticated, untraceable cargos are preferred such as timber, wire, metal and minerals.

The time of attack is usually between 1:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m. During those hours, most of the crew is either asleep, on the bridge or below decks in noisy engine spaces. Little attention is paid to the sound of grappling hooks thrown over the stern. Even a vessel making over 17 knots is not safe from expert pirates who come alongside at high speed and board in seconds.

These can be pretty sophisticated thugs, using radar and global positioning systems to track their prey. Modern pirates have even been known to carry computer generated cargo manifests, which have been obtained in advance for later use during machine gun enforced "shopping sprees." Another trick is a new twist on what can be called the 'little mermaid' concept. Sometimes, pirates will use prostitutes for luring crews into what can be called 'submission'. This is to ensure that their vessel might be more easily attacked and taken. The facts of each attack may be different, and increasingly more innovative, but escape is always easy because help for the merchant vessel is not "just around the corner."

Frequently the pirates even communications so that further punishment can be meted out to victims who might make a "May Day" or distress call. The terror experienced by lone victims at sea is not an emotion we can readily understand.