[JURIST] The UN Security Council [official website] on Wednesday unanimously adopted a resolution [press release] renewing its international call to fight piracy off the coast of Somalia. Working under Chapter VII of the UN Charter [text], resolution 2184 (2014) calls on all able states to provide military forces to repress piracy in the region. The Security Council also continued an exemption on a 1992 arms embargo imposed on Somalia and encouraged states to adopt legal framework to facilitate the prosecution of suspected pirates. Such efforts [UNODC report], both inland and off the coast of Africa, have slowed [IMO report] the frequency of pirate attacks in the area since 2012.

A number of countries around the world have taken actions in the attempt to solve the problem of maritime piracy [JURIST news archive]. In August security forces arrested [JURIST report] Somali pirate Mohamed Garfanji, then second-in-command of Somalia’s pirate industry. Last year a judge for the US District Court Eastern District of Virginia [official website] sentenced [JURIST report] Somali pirates Abukar Osman Beyle and Shani Nurani Shiekh Abrar to 21 life sentences for their roles in the killing of four Americans aboard a yacht off the Horn of Africa in February 2011. Also that year three Somali pirates accused of hijacking [JURIST report] a private yacht off the coast of Somalia in 2009 faced trial in France. In February of last year the Abu Dhabi Federal Appeal Court upheld the sentences [JURIST report] of ten Somali pirates convicted of highjacking a UAE-owned bulk-carrier ship in April 2011. In October 2012 the Hanseatic Higher Regional Court of Hamburg [official website, in German] issued sentences [JURIST report] for ten Somalis who were involved in the hijacking the German freighter MS Taipan off the coast of Somalia two years ago.