The International Maritime Organization

Module United Nations Club

Position paper

Dear Delegates,

Maritime security is a key issue since eighty percent of the world’s cargo is transported through the sea and it is less protected than the mainland. As a result of lacking surveillance there are greater chances of terrorist and piracy attacks. These attacks affect nations worldwide because it hurts the economy, human lives are lost, and places inadequate pressure on world’s politics. In order to provide a solution to this problem it is essential to first distinguish pirates from terrorist. There are many similarities such as violent acts, but the difference is their purpose to attack. The purpose to make violent acts of terrorism groups such as al qaeda is to impose their political or religious views upon the government. Their intention is to scare tourists and merchants in order to hurt the economy. They want their acts to be known by the entire world while a pirate according to the International Maritime Organization (IMO) a pirate is a person, who commits illegal acts of violence, detention, or of any act of depravation for private ends. Since terrorist are pirates are not the same they need to be treated differently. The measures that need to be taken in order to solve the problems against terrorism and piracy should be similar but not the same.

The International Maritime Organization (IMO) is an agency in the United Nations that is responsible for maritime security. IMO has 167 Member States and 3 Associate Members that are representing a wide range of shipping interests around the world. This agency in the United Nations is extremely important because most of the cargo around the world is transported by the sea. The latest regulation is the Long-range identification and tracking of ships. This is a mandatory requirement for international voyages; passenger ships, cargo ships. Ships that are build on or after December 31 2008 must be fitted with the system to transmit automatically the identity of the ship, the location of the ship, and the date and time of the position. This regulation will help to control piracy and terrorism since the ships will have a more accurate identification. This will help to secure the seas because it will be easier to track ships that are involved with terrorist or piracy. It will also help to warn other