Maritime Studies & Blue Economy

Assignment on
Maritime Peculiar Case Studies Analysis
For Prof. R.P. Pradhan

Submitted by -:
Ketan Paliwal – 2015B2A40720G
Vedant Diwanji – 2015A7PS0107G
Ria Arora - 2015A7PS0105G
Kunal Dewan - 2015A7PS0011G
Amit Phabba - 2015A7PS0068G
(BITS PILANI, KK BIRLA GOA CAMPUS)
Contents
 Maritime Border conflicts between South Korea and
North Korea

The Northern Limit Line or North Limit Line (NLL)– is a disputed

maritime demarcation line in the Yellow (West) Sea between the Democratic People's
Republic of Korea (DPRK) on the north, and the Republic of Korea (ROK) on the south.
This line of military control acts as the de facto maritime boundary between North and
South Korea. The 1953 Armistice Agreement, which was signed by both North Korea
and the United Nations Command (UNC), ended the Korean War and specified that the
five islands including Yeonpyeong Island and Baengnyeong Island would remain under
the control of the UNC and South Korea. However, they did not agree on a maritime
demarcation line, primarily because the UNC wanted to base it on 3 nautical miles
(5.6 km) of territorial waters, while North Korea wanted to use 12 nautical miles (22 km).
Thus the border is not officially recognized by North Korea. This is evident by the
borders considered by the two countries as shown in the diagram.

The disputed maritime border between

North and South Korea in the West Sea:

A: United Nations Command-

created Northern Limit Line, 1953

B: North Korea-declared "Inter-

Korean MDL", 1999] The locations of
specific islands are reflected in the
configuration of each maritime
boundary, including
Yeonpyeong Island
Baengnyeong Island
Daecheong Island

https://asmmag.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/north_south_korea_border.jpg

The North Korean and South Korean navies regularly patrol the area around the NLL.
As North Korea does not recognize the line, its fishing boats work close to or over the
limit line, escorted by North Korean naval boats. Clashes between North and South
Korean fishing boats and naval vessels have frequently occurred along the NLL. As the
waters along the NLL are rich in blue crab, the seaborne clashes have sometimes been
dubbed the "Crab Wars".

Incidents include:

 First Battle of Yeonpyeong (1999) – four North Korean patrol boats and a group of
fishing boats crossed the border and initiated a gun battle that left one North Korean
vessel sunk, five patrol boats damaged, 30 sailors killed, and 70 wounded.
 Second Battle of Yeonpyeong (2002) – two North Korean patrol boats crossed the
NLL near Yeonpyeong Island and started firing; after becoming outnumbered and
suffering damage, the vessels retreated.
 On 1 November 2004 three North Korean vessels crossed the NLL. They were
challenged by South Korean patrol boats, but did not respond. The ROK vessels
opened fire and the DPRK boats withdrew without returning fire. No casualties were
reported.
 Battle of Daecheong (2009) – A North Korean gun boat crossed the NLL and
entered waters near Daecheong Island, South Korean vessels opened fire
reportedly causing serious damage to a North Korean patrol ship and one death. [43]
 On January 27, 2010, North Korea fired artillery shots into the water near the NLL
and South Korean vessels returned fire. The incident took place near the South
Korean-controlled Baengnyeong Island. Three days later, North Korea continued to
fire artillery shots towards the area.
 ROKS Cheonan sinking (2010) – The ROKS Cheonan (PCC-772), a South Korean
corvette, was sunk by an explosion, killing 46 sailors; the resulting South-Korea-led
international investigation blamed North Korea, which denied involvement.
 Bombardment of Yeonpyeong (2010) – North Korean forces fired around 170
artillery shells at Yeonpyeong, killing four South Koreans, injuring 19, and causing
widespread damage to the island's civilian fishing village.

Altogether, the disputes have resulted in:

 54 North Korean military personnel killed

 54 South Korean military personnel killed
 95 North Korean military personnel wounded
 99 South Korean military personnel wounded
 4 South Korean civilians killed
 19 South Korean civilians wounded
Materiel losses and damage include:

 1 North Korean torpedo boat sunk

 1 North Korean gunboat damaged
 6 North Korean patrol boats damaged
 1 South Korean corvette sunk
 1 South Korean patrol boat sunk
 1 South Korean corvette damaged
 2 South Korean patrol boats damaged

Economic Impact of the zone for both countries:

Fishermen from the two Koreas also have great interest in the disputed NLL area,
especially during the peak blue crab season in June. King Crab fetches NOK 220
per kg as well as various other species of crab like blue, red and so on making it a
lucrative business for fishermen. This is indicated by the staggering trade of crabs
between North Korea and China worth approximately $11 billion which is a
significant contributor to North Korean economy. So North Korea has a vested
interest in these waters.

Chinese Involvement:

Because crab is considered a delicacy in China and neither of the two Korean
republics ventures into the disputed waters, Chinese fishermen are fishing
extensively in the Yellow Sea. This has resulted in the crab yield of South Korea to
be approximately 5/6th yield of its previous feat. This is also resulting in increasing
tensions between the two countries as Chinese fishermen are constantly entering
the restricted zone and the patrolling by both Korean republics is increasing which is
resulting in constant warning shots being fired in the region.
 Aral Sea Crisis
The Aral Sea was an endorheic lake lying between Kazakhstan in the north
and Uzbekistan in the south.

Formerly one of the four largest lakes in the world with an area of
68,000 km2 (26,300 sq mi), the Aral Sea has been shrinking since the 1960s after
the rivers that fed it were diverted by Soviet irrigation projects. By 1997, it had
declined to 10% of its original size, splitting into four lakes – the North Aral Sea, the
eastern and western basins of the once far larger South Aral Sea, and one smaller
intermediate lake.[5] By 2009, the southeastern lake had disappeared and the
southwestern lake had retreated to a thin strip at the western edge of the former
southern sea; in subsequent years, occasional water flows have led to the
southeastern lake sometimes being replenished to a small degree.
Image shows

The Aral Sea in 1989 (left) and 2014

(right)

The shrinking of the Aral Sea

has been called "one of the
planet's worst environmental
disasters". The region's once-
prosperous fishing industry has
been essentially destroyed,
bringing unemployment and
economic hardship.

The ecosystems of the Aral Sea and the river deltas feeding into it have been nearly
destroyed, not least because of the much higher salinity. The receding sea has left
huge plains covered with salt and toxic chemicals resulting from weapons testing,
industrial projects, and pesticides and fertilizer runoff. These substances form wind-
borne toxic dust that spreads throughout the region. As a result, the land around the
Aral Sea is heavily polluted, and the people living in the area are suffering from a
lack of fresh water and health problems, including high rates of certain forms of
cancer and lung diseases. Respiratory illnesses, including tuberculosis (most of
which is drug resistant) and cancer, digestive disorders, anaemia, and infectious
diseases are common ailments in the region. Liver, kidney, and eye problems can
also be attributed to the toxic dust storms. All of this has resulted in an unusually
high fatality rate among vulnerable parts of the population: the child mortality rate is
75 in every 1,000 newborns, and maternity death is 12 in every 1,000
women.[26] The dust storms also contribute to water shortages through salt
 deposition.[25] The overuse of pesticides on crops to preserve yields has made this
worse, with pesticide use far beyond health limits. Crops in the region are destroyed
by salt being deposited onto the land, and fields are being flushed with water at least
four times per day to try to remove the salinity from the soils. The dust storms make
regional winters colder, and summers hotter.

The Aral Sea fishing industry, which in its heyday employed some 40,000 and
reportedly produced one-sixth of the Soviet Union's entire fish catch, has been
devastated, and former fishing towns along the original shores have become ship
graveyards. Aral, originally the main fishing port, is now several miles from the sea
and has seen its population decline dramatically since the beginning of the
crisis.[31] The town of Moynaq in Uzbekistan had a thriving harbor and fishing
industry that employed about 30,000 people;[32] now it lies miles from the shore.
Fishing boats lie scattered on the dry land that was once covered by water; many
have been there for 20 years. The only significant fishing company left in the area
has its fish shipped from the Baltic Sea, thousands of kilometers away.
Possible environmental solutions
Many different solutions to the problems have been suggested over the years, varying
in feasibility and cost, including:

 Improving the quality of irrigation canals

 Installing desalination plants
 Charging farmers to use the water from the rivers
 Using alternative cotton species that require less water[34]
 Promoting non-agricultural economic development in upstream countries[35]
 Using fewer chemicals on the cotton
 Cultivating crops other than cotton
 Installing dams to fill the Aral Sea
 Redirecting water from the Volga, Ob and Irtysh Rivers to restore the Aral Sea to its
former size in 20–30 years at a cost of US$30–50 billion[36]
 Pumping sea water into the Aral Sea from the Caspian Sea via a pipeline, and
diluting it with fresh water from local catchment areas[37]
In January 1994, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan,
and Kyrgyzstan signed a deal to pledge 1% of their budgets to help the sea recover.
In March 2000, UNESCO presented their "Water-related vision for the Aral Sea basin
for the year 2025"[38] at the second World Water Forum in The Hague. This document
was criticized for setting unrealistic goals and for giving insufficient attention to the
interests of the area immediately around the former lakesite, implicitly giving up on the
Aral Sea and the people living on the Uzbek side of the lake.
 Somalia Pirate Business Model

Piracy off the coast of Somalia has been a threat to international

shipping since the second phase of the Somali Civil War, around 2000.

Map of areas under threat by Somali pirates (2005–2010)

After the collapse of the central government in the ensuing civil war,
the Somali Navy disbanded. With Somali territorial waters undefended,
foreign fishing trawlers began illegally fishing on the Somali seaboard
and ships began dumping industrial and other waste off the Somali
coast. This led to erosion of the fish stock and local fishermen started to
band together to try to protect their resources. An escalation began,
leading to weapons being used and tactics such as taking over a foreign
ship until their owners paid a ransom. After seeing the profitability of
ransom payments, some financiers and former militiamen later began to
fund pirate activities, splitting the profits evenly with the pirates. In most
of the hijackings, the pirates have not harmed their prisoners.

Step 1: Round up investors to provide start-up capital.

Step 2: Gather between eight and twelve pirates to form the at-sea team. They
will need "a minimum of two attack skiffs, weapons, equipment, provisions,
fuel and preferably a supply boat." Each pirate should bring his own firearm in
exchange for a class A share of the profits. If a pirate brings a skiff or a
particularly heavy-duty firearm like a machine gun or, say, a rocket launcher,
throw in another share. One more share to the guy who boards the besieged
ship first.

Step 3: Assemble another team of about 12 people. Each class A pirate can
contribute a friend or relative to this team. These are the class B investors and
they'll provide land-based protection. The B shares are typically set at a fixed
amount, currently worth about $15,000.

Step 4: Hijack ship, take hostages.

Step 5: Find someone to front the cost of the siege -- to be repaid with
interest -- while the ransom is negotiated.

Step 6: Collect ransom.

Step 7: Distribute profits. The lead investor gets a 30 percent cut, local elders
are paid between 5 and 10 percent for anchoring rights and the class B holders
receive their fixed-sum payouts. Whatever is left is split among the class A
shareholders.

First, the dramatic transfer of wealth into Somali communities was

immense. In the absence of significant foreign aid to Somalia, and with
little to no traditional means of income, Somalis turned to the
one opportunity available to them: piracy. Despite the risk of death or
imprisonment, “the 0.01 percent they might make — $30,000 on
average — is 54 times the country’s average annual salary of about
$550.”

As piracy increased, so did the wealth transfer that moved millions of

dollars from ransom payers to the pirates. As ransom money poured
into Somalia, “it [went] into the local economy, creating jobs and wealth
and fueling micro economies along the coast.” This significant transfer
of wealth affected real estate development, sent basic wages through
the roof, employed thousands and even created its own investment
market.
The benefit was not limited to pirates. In an odd turn of
events, piracy benefited the local fishing industry. Before, large oversized
foreign fishing vessels would troll through their fishing waters catching the
fish faster than they could be replenished. Now, with the fear of piracy in
the nearby shore waters, rarely does anyone come through anymore.
This left a significant increase in the supply of fish for the local fishermen
and their communities. Fishermen can now catch upward of £200 a day,
whereas before they averaged under £5.

USS IMPECCABLE
The 2009 harassment of USNS Impeccable in the South China Sea
marked a strong reemergence of surveillance confrontations in the PRC’s
EEZ. This incident occurred intermittently over a four-day period. U.S. and
PRC perceptions of the USNS Impeccable incident are contrasted to
reconstruct the encounter.

The American ship, an unarmed ocean surveillance vessel, was conducting

routine operations in the South China Sea 75 miles south of Hainan Island,
according to the Pentagon.“Our ships operate fairly regularly in
international waters where these incidents took place,” White House
spokesman Robert Gibbs told a news conference. “We are going to
continue to operate in those international waters and we expect the
Chinese to observe international laws around them.”

There are two different claims to the story. While China repeatedly claims
that it was United States which unlawfully entered its territory but it is the
United States’ account of the story which is truly disturbing.

A Chinese sailor used a long grappling hook to try to snag

a cable that the Impeccable was using to tow an underwater listening device known as a Surtass array, said a U.S. Navy
spokesman. CreditU.S. Navy
 1. U.S Perception:

five PRC vessels–a navy intelligence ship, a government

fisheries-patrol vessel, a state oceanographic patrol vessel, and two small
fishing trawlers–surrounded and harassed Impeccable approximately
seventy five miles south of Hainan Island. the Chinese crew also attempted
to snag the cable for the towed array. The reports suggest danger of
collision and injury. Other media accounts relay that one PRC vessel
approached as its sailors waved Chinese
flags and the Impeccable responded with fire-hoses, after which the
Chinese crew
stripped down to their underwear. Chinese crew members waved flags and
demanded the US ship leave. They also tried to catch the ship's
underwater listening equipment. At one moment the path of the ship was
blocked. The next day, Chinese aircraft repeatedly buzzed the ship at an
altitude of about 600 feet. Finally, after informing the PRC vessels that it
Intended to depart the scene, two of the PRC vessels stopped directly
ahead of USNS Impeccable, forcing an emergency ‘all stop’ in order to
avoid collision. They dropped pieces of wood in the water directly in front of
Impeccable’s path.

2. Chinese Perception:
U.S. Navy surveillance ship Impeccable violated the provisions of relevant
international law as well as Chinese laws and regulations, conducting
activities in China’s exclusive economic zone without Chinese permission.
China has made solemn representations with the United States regarding
this. We demand that the united States immediately stop related activities
and adopt effective measures to avoid a repeat of similar incidents. Our
civilian and military vessels have the right to do things in our exclusive
economic zone. PLAN Rear Admiral Zhang Deshun also stated, “The
location where the confrontation occurred is our economic territory, where
we have sovereignty…it’s nonsense that the U.S., which offends
international law, should complain about us first.”
Following the confrontation, diplomatic channels were engaged, while the
U.S. asserted its right to freedom of navigation in the EEZ, protecting the
Impeccable under military escort. On the diplomatic front, the PRC Foreign
Ministry received a formal protest from the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, while
military officials met with the PRC’s defense attaché at the Pentagon on
March 9 to discuss the incident. During previously arranged meetings with
the PRC’s Foreign Minister Yang on March 11 and 12, Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton and President Obama discussed how to reduce tensions and
increase dialogue to prevent similar future incidents. Lyle Goldstein states
that by March 12: “President Obama ordered the USS Chung-Hoon [DDG-
93], a guided missile destroyer, to escort the Impeccable as it continued its
mission in the South China Sea. Beijing did not elect to escalate the crisis
by countering this deployment.”

The 2009 USNS Impeccable incident displayed a renewal of surveillance

confrontations involving U.S. surveillance vessels operating in the PRC’s EEZ.