Arrrrrr-vinder Sambei, ay!

As surprising as it may be, and it is surprising as can be, pirates still exist, and I'm not talking about the type of pirates who download music, movies or software from the internet. I'm talking about the type of pirates who hunt down ships in the oceans, takes over them, steal their cargo, and often kill its crew.

That type of pirates live and prosper in Somalia, and that types of pirates recently attacked "Africa Star", an Israeli cargo ship. This ship was attacked by pirates last year, and was saved by the fact it had barbed wire fence all around it, blocking the pirates from boarding the ship.

Recently, on March 24 and again on March 27, this ship was again attacked by pirates near Somalia. During the March 24 incident, the pirates opened fire at the ship, and the Israeli security team shot back and killed one of the pirates.

In response to this act of self defense UN official Arvinder Sambei, a legal consultant for the United Nations’ ant piracy program, said that it "will be scrutinized very closely" and that "there’s always been concern about these (private security) companies". She concluded by saying "the bottom line is somebody has been killed and someone has to give an accounting of that".

Pirates attacked a ship, a pirate was killed in the attack, and a UN official is concerned about the private security companies, and says that somebody will need to give an accounting of that.
Maybe if the UN was less focused on the rights of pirates and was more worried about the fact pirates can freely act in 2010, maybe then nobody would have been killed. However, it makes you wonder: if the UN really cares more about pirates than it cares about normative, law-abiding people, maybe the fact the UN favors Hamas and Hezbuallah over Israel only makes sense?

Then again... what if the ship wasn't Israeli, and the guards weren't Israeli... What if the ship and the guards were all nice, Christian, Europeans - would that still be the UN's position?