By Barry Malone
ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - Somalia's prime minister said on Wednesday that foreign navies patrolling off Somalia's coast have failed to discourage piracy "an inch" and condemned firms paying ransoms to sea gangs hijacking ships.
Somali buccaneers have made millions of dollars seizing vessels in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean, and have driven up insurance rates for merchant ships passing through the waterways linking Europe to Asia.
"The only reason people (become pirates) is because the companies are deciding to pay ransoms," Omar Abdirashid Ali Sharmarke told reporters in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa.
"That is what encouraged several young kids to go into the waters. Our policy has always been 'don't pay ransoms'," said the Western-educated son of an assassinated former president.
Sharmarke's government is trying to quell an Islamist-led insurgency onshore that has displaced one million people and killed thousands. But international attention has focussed on pirates operating in the strategic sea routes.
Organisers of a donors' meeting in Brussels this week say the transitional government needs $165 million (113 million pounds) over the next year to build its security forces.
Sharmarke said foreign navies patrolling Somalia's coastline have not been able to stem the sea gangs. There were 18 pirate attacks in March alone, the International Maritime Bureau says.
"They (the navies) have not discouraged (the pirates) an inch. The only way out is to have a Somali security force on the ground that can prevent piracy before it happens," he said.
"Our objective is for the international community to help us build our security forces," Sharmarke said. "Home-grown problems can only be dealt with by home-grown solutions."
TRIALS
In Kenya's Mombasa port, the French navy handed over 11 pirates on Wednesday captured in a naval raid earlier this month. The Somalis are expected to face trial in Kenya.
Several pirates taken after seizing French ships are facing trial in France, but some have demanded to be sent back to Somalia.
On Tuesday, a U.S. judge ruled that a Somali teenager accused of holding hostage a U.S. ship captain would be tried as an adult for piracy in New York. In a raid to free the captain earlier this month, U.S. forces killed three pirates and captured Abduwali Abdukhadir Muse.
Analysts say the best way to defeat gangs offshore is for Somalia to have an effective central government onshore.
The Horn of Africa nation has been wracked by instability and violence since dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was ousted in 1991. Since then, there has been little effective central rule.
"The piracy epidemic is just one symptom of the appalling humanitarian conditions and chronic instability in Somalia," Bruce Hickling, of the aid group International Rescue Committee, said in a statement.
(Additional reporting by Celestine Achieng in Mombasa; Writing by Jack Kimball; Editing by Giles Elgood)
