Who Finances Somali Pirates?
Piracy has start-up & maintenance costs. Boats, guns & men cost money, & historically, pirates were often financed by capitalists who took a cut of pirate ventures or gained politically from them.
There's the obvious case of privateers, pirates in the service of governments. But even famous "independent" pirates often worked for behind-the-scenes money-men. For example, Captain Kidd was backed by some English lords & Robert Livingston the Elder of NY, first Lord of Livingston Manor (160,000 acres), & ancestor of a good fraction of the US Social Register.
This 2008 UN Security Council report confirms the existence of financiers:
http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N08/604/73/PDF/N0860473.pdf?OpenElement"In many respects, the organization of piracy operations is guided more by the
principles of private enterprise than military strategy and planning. Financiers,
including Boyah and a number of other prominent business and political figures
with fisheries assets, advance the seed money for the maritime militias to function.
Typically they provide the boats, fuel, arms and ammunition, communications
equipment and the salaries of the pirates, in order that they scout and seize vessels.
Increasingly, these advance teams appear to be benefiting from intelligence provided
by contacts who monitor major ports in neighbouring countries.
...the financier must identify a sponsor (or team of sponsors) who will underwrite the
costs of the operation in exchange for a share of the ransom. Once this is achieved,
the financier directs the captured vessel to a “refuge” port, where his ground team
can ensure provisions and local protection pending payment of ransom. The team
may also include negotiators with foreign language skills, local officials and elders.
Eventually, a host of other actors also become associated with the operation: senior
government officials who provide political cover and protection, money launderers
who help to transfer ransom payments or exchange unwanted currency notes..."
According to the report, in 2006 there were just "a few dozen" pirates, based in fishing communities, rooted in grievances over foreign fish poaching & waste dumping. They evolved into 1000-1500, linked through clan & militia networks. The financiers & sponsors are said to take about half the ransom money, the pirates 30%.
Thus, the pirates are no longer (if they ever completely were) just a bunch of poor fisher-guys who decided to commandeer a ship. They work for bigger fish who outfit & command them.
Somalia's a poor country. Per capita GDP = $600. 40% of GDP comes from livestock, 10% industry. Livestock & bananas are 65% of export earnings. Most Somalis live at subsistence level. So where do the "financiers & sponsors" get their capital?
Somalian spheres of influence (info from the UN report)
Somalia's about the size of France but has a coastline as long as the US eastern seaboard.
It's been the site of proxy wars almost continually since the 1800s. It's not a unified "country". Control divides into rough thirds.
Northeast: Somaliland
Somaliland in the northeast has declared independence from the rest of Somalia. It gets funds from the European Commission, the British government, the United Nations, & cooperates with & reportedly receives military training from Ethiopia (US ally). It has an intelligence service, which receives funding from Britain.
North-central: The TFG
Somalia's northern & central territories are semi-autonomous, in loose federation under the loose central authority of the Transitional Federal Government. The TFG/Somali police forces are mostly paid by the UN. Somalia's TFG area has an intelligence, "counter-terrorism," & policing service "largely funded by foreign governments," the only one named being the US.
The Puntland State within this federation has its *own* security & intelligence services (trained by Ethiopia), The US set up the intelligence services, & a private British military company (Hart Security Maritime, akin to corps like Blackwater) set up its Coast Guard. Puntland is a site of oil potential.
The Islamic South
Somalia's southern states are loosely controlled by the Islamic Courts Union. The UN report doesn't consider this region's administration legitimate. It's characterized as "Opposition to the Transitional Federal Government".
The South is allied with Eritrea, Ethiopia's enemy. Backers of Eritrea in its (70s-90s) independence fight with Ethiopia included China, Syria, & Egypt.
The report says the various southern opposition groups are funded by Eritrea, businesses, the Somalian diaspora, clans/militia, & 'al-qaeda'.
Thousands of Ethiopian troops were, at the time of the report, stationed around Mogadishu, a flash-point in the disputed territory roughly dividing north & south Somalia.
Who Finances Somali Pirates?
The two main base sites for pirates are Puntland & Galmudug, both inside the TFG sphere of influence. The individuals mentioned as pirate leaders a/o financiers in the UN report are:
Farah Hirsi Kulan “Boyah”: Based in Puntland. No other information.
Garaad Mohamud Mohamed
According to the UN report, based in Harardhere, Galmudug. However, Global Security says he operates around the Southern Islamic sphere of influence: "The National Volunteer Coast Guard (NVCG), commanded by Garaad Mohamed, is said to specialize in intercepting small boats and fishing vessels around Kismayu on the southern coast." (To whom would those "small fishing boats" around Kismayo belong?)
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/para/pirates.htm. Mohamed Abdi Hassan “Afweyne”:
Based in Harardhere, Galmudug. Supposedly member of Suleiman clan, one of the subclans of clan Hawiye (Habar Gidir). Hawiye is the supra-clan of the former Prime Minister (2004-2007) of Somalia, Ali Mohamed Ghedi, who plans to run for office this year.
Mohamed Abdi Hassan ('Afweyne') or a relation, is mentioned in this 2006 report:
"On Monday August 14, according to Mail & Guardian, Middle East Online, Nasdaq and the BBC, the Islamists announced that they had taken over two coastal towns, Eldher and Harardheere, which had been used as pirate bases. As the Islamists moved in, pirates loyal to regional warlord Abdi Mohamed Afweyne moved out."
http://www.westernresistance.com/blog/archives/002804.htmlSo the pirate leaders are based in regions funded by western governments, nominally controlled by western-approved compradors.
Furthermore, the UN report represents the pirates & their leaders as actors who also involved in arms & other smuggling. The pirate payoff networks are said to reach high into government & military officialdom.
They don't seem to be aligned with islamic forces in the south, e.g.:
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5huZX1j35evP_2f7juvNifVKrMboQOne of the UN group's recommendations refers to pirate "sponsors" in the Puntland government:
"the Monitoring Group believes that interdiction of arms trafficking across the Gulf of Aden and the imposition of targeted sanctions against key pirate leaders and their sponsors in the Puntland administration would represent a significant contribution to international piracy efforts."
Though the pirate networks are clan-based, they can't exactly be said to be rooted in "tradition". Tradition has been undercut & distorted by the influence of outside money & power, per Norway's independent monitoring agency, Country of Origin Information Centre (Landinfo):
"Clans are still important, but it is evident that clan loyalty is superseded by political, ideological and international conditions...one needs to examine the external power relations and the material benefits associated with such changes. And these have been exceptionally dynamic in the past decade. The clan system is amazingly adaptable to the changing demands of the international community, as well as the challenges of statelessness and pastoralism. In fact there is little doubt that the proliferation, fragmentation, and - in some cases - consolidation of clan identities were strongly influenced by the presence of outside, resource-rich groups, such as the United Nations and Western development agencies.'"
http://www.landinfo.no/asset/784/1/784_1.pdf.In other words, big foreign money corrupts poor countries & destroys traditional folkways & authority in the same way drug dealers with big money corrupt poor communities in the US.
So it appears that western countries, wittingly or unwittingly, provide one of the major finance & influence streams for the pirates.
This commentary from another conflict gives food for thought:
"Since February, when the foreign aid was cut, the Palestinian Authority has been unable to pay salaries to its 160,000 employees. These workers provide direct livelihood to...almost a third of the population, and if their salaries are not paid...the Palestinian economy will totally collapse.
Both Israel and the United States are now thinking of ways to alleviate the dire situation—after all, no wants to be blamed for producing a famine. Together they have adopted a scheme that could be called the “Somalia Plan.”
The idea is to transfer salaries directly to the bank accounts of those 90,000 PA workers who are employed by civil institutions... The remaining 70,000 Palestinians who work for one of numerous security apparatuses...will not receive salaries. This will keep the economy just above the famine level, leaving 70,000 armed men with nothing but frustration and anger.
Under such conditions, a struggle is sure to break out among the different Palestinian warlords over the scant resources in the Occupied Territories...
If the existing skirmishes among the different factions develop into full-blown battle, it may very well be that certain segments of the Palestinian population will go hungry. Yet, it’s the warlords or faction leaders, rather than Israel or the United States, who will be blamed for the human catastrophe. We are, in other words, witnessing Somalia in the making..."
http://209.85.173.132/search?q=cache:kzffFw-1o8oJ:www.inthesetimes.com/article/2692/the_us_israeli_omalia_plan/+somalia+israel&cd=8&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us 
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