'Piracy never happened'

The government yesterday reasserted that there had been not a single incident of "piracy" within 200 nautical miles off the coast of Bangladesh and requested the local media not to use the word for "petty thefts" and "armed robbery".
Since local media were reporting robbery and petty theft as piracy, international organisations like International Maritime Bureau (IMB) counted these incidents as "piracy" and branded Bangladesh as a piracy-prone and high-risk country, Additional Foreign Secretary Khorshed Alam told reporters at the foreign ministry.
This would not only harm the image of Bangladesh but also increase the cost of international trade, he said.
Some ships without reporting to the Coast Guard or the port authority had given "false" report to the IBM and consequently, the IBM termed Bangladesh a piracy-prone country based on these "false" reports, he said.
The secretary said Bangladesh could not be called a piracy-prone country because there had happened no incident of "piracy" off the coast as stated in the definition of the UN Convention on Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).
There were some incidents of "armed robbery" or "petty theft" and the number was coming down, he said, adding that the incidents occurred near the shore but these did not construe piracy.