"Somali pirates have accused European firms of dumping toxic waste off the Somali coast and are demanding an $8m ransom for the return of a Ukranian ship they captured, saying the money will go towards cleaning up the waste.
The ransom demand is a means of 'reacting to the toxic waste that has been continually dumped on the shores of our country for nearly 20 years', Januna Ali Jama, a spokesman for the pirates, based in the semi-autonomous region of Puntland, said.
'The Somali coastline has been destroyed, and we believe this money is nothing compared to the devastation that we have seen on the seas.'"
Later in the article it was stated, "Ould-Abdallah [the UN envoy for Somalia] declined to name which companies are involved in waste dumping, citing legal reasons."
The article goes on to say that the Somali pirates have been responsible for at least 61 attacks since the beginning of the year, and that radioactive uranium waste, heavy metals such as cadmium and mercury, industrial waste, hospital wastes and chemical wastes have all been alleged to have been dumped into the ocean surrounding Somalia, corroborated through UN officials' statements, beached toxic waste containers, and "...hundreds of residents have fallen ill, suffering from mouth and abdominal bleeding, skin infections and other ailments."
ORIGINAL SOURCE: Al Jazeera
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