More high drama on high seas as France captures pirate ship

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More high drama on high seas as France captures pirate ship
By Shashank Bengali and Warren P. Strobel | McClatchy Newspapers
4/16/09

MOMBASA, Kenya " On another day of high drama in the waters off Somalia, French forces struck Wednesday at what they described as a pirate "mother ship," and captured 11 suspected pirates hours after pirates attacked an American cargo ship with rockets in the second serious attack on a U.S. vessel in a week.

Pirates operating from the coast of Somalia have threatened revenge and stepped up their activities after U.S. Navy SEAL snipers killed three pirates Sunday and rescued American captain Richard Phillips, who'd been taken hostage. His ship, the Maersk Alabama, narrowly escaped capture a few days earlier.

In the Wednesday attack, pirates used automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades against the U.S.-flagged vessel, the Liberty Sun, which like the Alabama, was ferrying food aid into East Africa. They caused damage but no injuries and failed to seize the vessel. The crew barricaded itself in a safe room, much as the Alabama's crew did, according to a crewmember's e-mail obtained by news agencies.

In Washington, senior aides to President Barack Obama met at the White House Wednesday morning to a plan strategy to deal with the crisis and to address the chaos in anarchic Somalia that's part of the problem.

After the meeting, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced several new steps, including aid to shippers and insurers to bolster their defenses; attempts to block pirates from buying sophisticated vessels and arms; and a diplomatic initiative to press Somali leaders to deal with the problem.

Clinton acknowledged that piracy will not be stopped without tackling Somalia's poverty and its lack of governance. She said, however, that, "You've got to put out the fire before you can rebuild the house. And, right now, we have a fire raging."

The French raid was an unusually aggressive move by international forces patrolling the Indian Ocean, and it was a sign that both pirate attacks and the international response are escalating.

After a Liberian-flagged container ship came under heavy rocket-propelled grenade and small-arms fire from two pirate speedboats, a French frigate, the Nivose, dispatched two helicopters to the scene, about 500 miles east of the Kenyan port of Mombasa, the French defense ministry said. The helicopters saw the skiffs operating with a 30-foot "mother ship" " often a previously seized vessel used by pirates as a floating base.

Eleven pirates were captured and taken aboard the Nivose.

The assault was the latest hardline French response to piracy, following a commando raid last week to free a French yacht, the Tanit, in which French troops killed two pirates and one French hostage. They captured three other pirates, who've been sent to France, where they're expected to face trial, French officials have said.

The Liberty Sun was due to arrive in Mombasa, its original destination, early Thursday.

The captain of the Alabama, Richard Phillips, who was held hostage for five days, was also due in Mombasa Thursday aboard the destroyer USS Bainbridge. Phillips is to be questioned by U.S. law enforcement agents based in Kenya and then will fly to the U.S. to reunite with his family, said Gordan Van Hook, a representative of the ship's owner, Maersk Line of Norfolk, Va.

The 19 other Alabama crewmen flew out of Mombasa and were expected to reunite with their families at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland, Van Hook said.

Clinton said she'd called for a meeting of an international "contact group" that deals with piracy from Somalia and would press for "an expanded multinational response."

A team of U.S. diplomats, she said, would engage officials of the weak Somalia government and regional leaders in Puntland, the breakaway Somali region where many pirates are based, to urge them to take action.

A State Department official, who requested anonymity to speak more frankly, said most of the steps Clinton announced drew from initiatives already under way and begun in the final days of the Bush administration.

Piracy will not be gotten under control until its root causes are dealt with, he said. "The real problem is that you have this huge swath of coastline which is essentially ungoverned, and which has no economy."

(Strobel reported from Washington.)

ON THE WEB

Puntland government's homepage
http://www.puntlandgovt.com/indexeng.php

What's it like to be a pirate? In dirt-poor Somalia, pretty good
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/homepage/story/58111.html

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wait a minute, are you sure the heading shouldn't be pirates capture french ship, cause rush and the right wing told me the french were cowards

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good for the french and **** rush limbaugh Mr. Green

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Both Obama and the French effectively using military force to protect American citizens against lawless criminals operating from a failed state, within one week?

Ann Coulter's head just exploded.

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@old europe,

That explains why Sec of State Clinton wants to have talks with the Somali Govt?

What Govt?

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@old europe,

a somewhat different look at somali pirates - there is more to it than glaring headlines :

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8001183.stm

Quote:

Piracy symptom of bigger problem
By Roger Middleton

Searching for satellite images of the pirate village of Eyl in Somalia, you are confronted not with palaces and piles of arms but a few crumbling houses and rows of battered boats along the beach.

Even here, where pirate millions first reach Somalia, desperate poverty is everywhere and insecurity is the norm.

US President Barack Obama has said that Somali piracy must be brought under control. But the world's attention is for the most part fixed on the ocean, while the real challenges lie ashore.

What we are seeing in the Gulf of Aden and western Indian Ocean is just the visible tip of a complex web of challenges inside Somalia, a web that reaches across the country, the region and the world.

Somalia is one of the poorest, most violent, least stable countries anywhere on Earth.

It suffers from severe drought and its people face hunger and violence on a daily basis. This is not a new situation, Somalia, especially the south, has been in this state for many years.

What is new is that the world is now once again concerned with the goings on of this collapsed state.

Somalis have learnt to live in circumstances under which many might be expected to give up.

In the face of overwhelming adversity they have created thriving businesses, operating entirely in the informal sector, and hospitals built and maintained with money sent home by the diaspora.

However, people who have been forgotten by the world and who hear of toxic waste being dumped on their beaches and foreigners stealing their fish have difficulty being concerned when representatives of that world are held to ransom.

And for many who have grown up surrounded by constant insecurity and bloodshed, violence and the risk of death are unexceptional hazards.

For this reason the current attempts to fight piracy from the sea are only dealing with symptoms. They do not address the reasons why young men are prepared to risk their lives chasing ships around the ocean.

Deadly country

Piracy is in essence a law and order issue, and in Somalia there is virtually no authority to carry out the kind of policing that could effectively disrupt pirate operations.

What government there is in Somalia has bigger problems.

The ongoing battle with the hard line Al Shabaab militia that controls Kismaayo and the deep south threatens not just the security of the state but has made Mogadishu one of the deadliest places on earth.

President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmad heads a fairly broad coalition but his opponents have men, weapons and money and are in a fierce struggle to gain control of the country.

When the internationally recognised government is fighting for control of its own capital city, combating pirates must seem a somewhat lower priority.

Even in the semi-autonomous region of Puntland in the north east, from where most pirate attacks are launched, the local government is contending with massive problems.

Boats laden with desperate refugees fleeing the war in Somalia leave almost daily, heading towards Yemen.

The smugglers often dump their human cargoes in the sea to avoid capture and leave them to drown.

Even for those who make it to the other side, life as second class citizens in already poor Yemen is dire.

No engagement

Somalia has spent almost 20 years in a state of civil war, and shifting alliances, international interventions and a steady supply of unemployed young men and cheap guns have acted against any tendencies towards stabilisation.

In a country where the average income is estimated at around $650 (£435) - Somalia is too anarchic for accurate statistics - the lure of up to $10,000 for a successful pirate raid is obvious.

The chronic instability of most of the country and the attendant daily threats to life mean that the risks associated with piracy can be seen as little worse than those faced every day.

Pirate bosses have little difficulty recruiting to fill any gaps in their crews. In this context a solution based on security systems and guns will not address the root causes of Somali piracy.

There are ways that navies from around the world can plaster over the problems of Somalia but as long as a state with grinding poverty, hunger, no law enforcement and no effective government sits beside a rich trading route, piracy will continue.

The outside world has for too long seen Somalia only in terms of threats to their own security.

Targeted missiles and interventions have been used to remove threatening individuals or groups but there has been no serious engagement with the political and developmental problems that allow those threats to take root.

If there is a silver lining to the piracy issue it may be that a deeper, broader and more imaginative engagement with Somalia develops.
Piracy is difficult for the nations of the world and disastrous for sailors - but for millions of Somalis the problems of their homeland are catastrophic.

Roger Middleton is coordinating a new project at the think-tank Chatham House investigating the economic dimensions of conflict in the Horn of Africa.

1 Reply

@hamburger,

Oh yes, I've read articles about the toxic waste dumping in Somalia, about the over-fishing of Somalian waters and about the non-existing government and general state of chaos. It's obviously not a black and white issue, and trying to permanently stop piracy in that particular area of the world would certainly involve a lot more than merely military interventions.

However, in the regard to the pirates themselves, I'm not going to argue that piracy can be justified by pointing to the background of where these people are coming from. Also, it's not like the money paid to the pirates goes in any way, shape or form towards improving the situation in the country.

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@old europe,

oe wrote :

Quote:

However, in the regard to the pirates themselves, I'm not going to argue that piracy can be justified by pointing to the background of where these people are coming from.

of course , the piracy cannot be justified , but as the writer points out (and he is not the only one) , it doesn't make much of a difference to the mostly young pirates where they are going to die - on water or on land .
people that are driven to extreme desperation will kill and be killed for a crust of bread .
and since the pirates might get a few days of better life out of their short lifes by collecting some ransom money , it probably sounds pretty attractive to them .

btw some sources suggest that most of the ransom money is being collected by taleban money lenders who supply the weapons to the pirates .

when it is being said that the taleban have been defeated , they'll emerge in some other place .

(it reminds of the reports one reads every few years : the mafia has been beaten , death blow to the mafia , the bosses have been arrested ... ... yet a few months later they seem to arise from the "ashes" - interesting , isn't it ? the police might be out of business is the mafia is ever totally eradicated - of course , there are assorted motocycle gangs etc to keep the police , the "legal "profession and the courts in business)

when the suez canal was blocked by the ships that were sunk in the canal , the merchant ships seemed to have little trouble going around the cape of good hope - and trade wasn't diminished from what i recall . perhaps the shipping companies need to wake up and consider that route again .
it won't solve the somalia problem ... so it's perhaps better to stick with the present route to keep reminding everyone of the REAL problem .
hbg

an interesting article from the BOSTON GLOBE re SOMALIA :

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2009/04/15/no_silver_bullet_for_somalia_problems/

that ends with this line :

Quote:

the real lesson we should take from this situation is that if we are going to effectively deal with the problem of "pirates gone wild" and the instability of the region, we need a comprehensive policy agenda rather than just stellar police action.

Charles R. Stith, a former US ambassador to Tanzania, is director of the African Presidential Archives and Research Center at Boston University

3 Replies

@hamburger,

hamburger wrote:

of course , the piracy cannot be justified , but as the writer points out (and he is not the only one) , it doesn't make much of a difference to the mostly young pirates where they are going to die - on water or on land .
people that are driven to extreme desperation will kill and be killed for a crust of bread .
and since the pirates might get a few days of better life out of their short lifes by collecting some ransom money , it probably sounds pretty attractive to them .

I absolutely agree that people driven by desperation will try to find means of securing their livelihood, even if this is extremely risky. However, there are several African states where living conditions are equally bad for a majority of the population. We just don't call those nations 'failed states' because they are dictatorships. However, in spite of similar conditions, incidents of piracy seem to disproportionately lower for those other countries. I would guess that the reason is that those dictatorships still enforce some kinds of rules, and punish piracy. In fact, during the rule of the Islamic Courts Union in Somalia, Sharia law was enforced, and, if I remember correctly, piracy was punished by death. The Islamists even wiped out a major base of piracy north of Mogadishu. After the collapse of the government, piracy incidents increased again.

So ironically, having an Islamist regime in place would be beneficial for all those nations who are currently affected by piracy off the coast of Somalia.

On the other hand, it seems to be morally questionable to simply ignore the plight of the population of Somalia, as long as any kind of regime manages to fight piracy efficiently. But in that case, you'd be arguing in favour of actively promoting the establishment of an at least somewhat democratic government and, essentially, nation building. Which is precisely what Western countries currently seem to be engaged in Afghanistan. It would kind of difficult for me to be highly critical of those efforts in Afghanistan and actively argue for the same kind of engagement in Somalia.

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Pirates have always been "marginal" people. Captain Johnson's history of "Pyrates" (Captain Johnson was probably a pseudonym of Daniel Defoe) is taken in large measure from the admiralty court records. In nearly every case, the skilled men, who would petty officers in any navy--the coopers, the sailmakers, the bosuns, the riggers, the carpenters, the gunners--were "forced men." That meant that they shipped against their will. The courts took this defense as a matter of course, and quite seriously.

Someone with a skill, and a valuable one which they could sell to the highest bidder, and one which paid them well enough to support a family, not only had no reason to turn to piracy, but every reason to avoid what has always been a capital offense. In time of war, which was most years in the the heyday of piracy, even the humble able bodied seaman could command good wages, if they could avoid the press gang, and foretopmen, bosun's and those qualified for a warrant (carpenters, coopers, riggers, etc.) could earn more than a Lieutenant in the navy. They had no reason to turn to piracy, and every reason not to.

People may have forgotten, but Somalia has been a failed state for almost 20 years. In the turmoil of the Gulf War in 1991, Mohamed Farah Aidid lead his clan, and several other allied clans, in overthrowing the government of Mohamed Said Barre. He was briefly president of Somalia in the mid 1990s, until he died of wounds sustained in a fire fight with the militia of a competing clan. Since 1991, there has been no stable government which could realistically claim to govern and control all of the country.

Somalia is a nation filled with young men who have nothing to lose. Unless a young man is a gunman in the militia of one of the clans, there is almost no prospect of employment. Even the distribution of humanitarian aid contributes to the problem--a farmer who has to walk two or three days to a food distribution center, and two or three days back home has precious little time to devote in the attempt to till land which was never generous in the best of times. Throughout history, those who have turned to piracy have been those those who had nothing to lose, or thought they had nothing to lose. I'd say that most of those who feel that way in Somalia are probably right.

Despite the ranting of conservatives, this has nothing to do with "Muslim terrorism." Piracy is, and always has been, plain and simple, about organized armed robbery. Anyone even passingly familiar with the situation in Somalia over the last 20 years will know that these operations have to be financed from outside the country, which does not itself possess the resources to finance such operations. Organized crime has seen an opportunity, and has seized it, and there will never be a problem recruiting warm bodies for the pirate crews for so long as Somalia remains a failed state. It's easy enough even in relatively stable nations with ocean coasts. How much easier in Somalia.

1 Reply

@hamburger,

Well our military always can used some live fire exercises and if they do not care where they die and therefore think it would be helpful to them to attack our shipping I am sure our militayr can help them enter the afterlife in any number they care to do so.

It kind of nice of them to offer themselves up for such a useful prupose of being targets.

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@Setanta,

Where did you get that history from?!?

Pirates crews was hardly the bottom of society in the Caribbean for example If anything they was clearly a number of steps above the kind of crews you would find on cargo ships of that same age.

Cargo ships and even navel warships had force crews but not on the whole pirates ships.

As the whole command structure of such ships wa agree to by the crews if did not allow the treatment of the crew with the same disreagard and terror that the captain of a warship or even of a cargo ship normally did show toward their crews.

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They must be a different soldiers from these ones ...........

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@BillRM,

In fact, i have made a particular study of the history of piracy, and in particular of the piracy in the Caribbean. I suggest to you that you read Captain Charles Johnson, who published A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the most notorious Pyrates in 1724, and A. O. Esquemeling, who book on the subject of piracy published in Holland in 1678 was considered the definitive text in its day. Henry Morgan attempted to sue Esquemeling for libel, and lost, in an English court.

The Royal Navy certainly impressed sailors in time of war, but merchant captains paid top wages in time of war, and built special compartments behind the bread room or between decks to hide their best seamen from RN crews searching their vessels. I don't know where you get this crap about "cargo ships" that "forced" their crew members, but it's about the wackiest thing i've ever heard about seaborne commerce.

As to what pirate crews would agree to, that was more a case of the terror they might inflict on their own commanders. Both Captain Kidd and Calico Jack Rackham claimed, with a good deal of justice and corroborating testimony, that they were forced to piracy by their crews.

I have something to go do now, which is more important than disabusing you of silly notions, which i don't have a clue where you might have dredged up, but if you want to continue the discussion, why don't you give some sources. I've given two, and two of the best. What sources do you have?

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@Setanta,

I love it when people try to re-write known history.

See the book “two years before the mast” as an example of what life was like under the best of conditions for crews abroad merchant sailing vessels.

In our own ports there was agents hired to drug and kidnapped sailors and others for crews.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghaiing

The role of crimps and the practice of shanghaiing resulted from a combination of laws, economic conditions, and practical considerations that existed on the American west coast in the mid-1800s. Crimps flourished in port cities like San Francisco in California, Portland[2] and Astoria in Oregon,[3] and Seattle[4] and Port Townsend in Washington.[5]

First, once a sailor signed onboard a vessel for a voyage, it was illegal for him to leave the ship before the voyage's end. The penalty was imprisonment, the result of federal legislation enacted in 1790.[6] This factor was weakened by the Maguire Act of 1895 and the White Act of 1898, before finally being eradicated by the Seamen's Act of 1915.

The most straightforward method for a crimp to shanghai a sailor was to render him unconscious, forge his signature on the ship's articles, and pick up his "blood money." This approach was widely used, but there were more profitable methods.[9]

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@Setanta,

You know your first position was that pirate crews was the bottom of the bottom and no where near the standard of merchant vessels or naval ships crews of the period of time and now you are now telling us that the crews was the ones who force their poor commanders to become outlaws in the first place!

Sorry they were indeed murderers and evil doers but the crew was not victims and neither were their leaders.

They all was looking for wealth beyond any they could dream of in any other manner and therefore was willing to run large risks to achieved that goal and the internal structure of such outfits resulted in far more equal treatment of the crews from the lowest up to the commanders then naval vessels or merchant vessels of that age.

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My position has not changed--these men were the losers of the seas, and anyone with a skill for sale had no interest in piracy. John Rackham--Calico Jack Rackham--was quartermaster of a privateer, who accepted election to the command of his ship when the crew decided that the captain was shy (a coward) and specifically because the captain would not attack a Frenchmen they had been shadowing. Rackham was never a successful, nor a popular commander as a pirate, and he is only remembered because of Anne Bonny and Mary Read, arguably the most notorious women pirates in history. They took over Rackham's operation, kept him drunk, and lasted less than a year. Captain William Kidd sailed with a letter of marque for the Persian Gulf, and many accounts of other witnesses to events state that he was given a choice of turning from privateer to pirate, or going for a swim.

I didn't say that anyone had it good before the mast, and i read Richard Henry Dana for the first time almost fifty years ago. What i said was that those who turned pirate were those who had little other choice to make a decent living, and your skewed and selective evidence only confirms that those with no skills to offer had no future. These men were illiterate, ignorant and often drunkards--read Blackbeard's logs sometime:

"Such a day, rum all out: -- Our company somewhat sober: -- A damned confusion amongst us! -- Rogues a-plotting:-- Great talk of separation -- so I looked sharp for a prize: -- Such a day took one, with a great deal of liquor on board, so kept the company hot, damned hot; then all things went well again."

These men were losers, and most of them had damned short careers--those who lasted any length of time, such as Henry Morgan or l'Olonnais, had the countenance or protection of someone; Morgan the English government in Jamaica, and l'Olonnais the French Protestants of the Florida Keys and Tortuga. Most pirates did not last long, which is precisely why men with a future and a skill, such as coopers, carpenters, riggers and sailmakers, had to be forced to ship in a pirate vessel.

Do some actual reading of something other than Two Years Before the Mast, learn something of the context of the times in which people lived (such as what conditions were like in other professions) and maybe you'll have something to argue. Anyone who tries to claim that sailors were pressed into merchant vessels is peddling bullshit, and doesn't know what the hell he's talking about.

1 Reply

@Setanta,

From Alexander the Great to the Spanish Conquistadors or to the pirates we are talking about men had sometimes chosen to earn their living by robbery and murder of their fellow men however that does not however imply they are losers or unskilled.

You are not able to run warships even small warships and prey on merchantmen many of who was also arm by being unskilled losers.

Short life maybe but one in many ways far better then serving on an English warship or a merchant man of that period and not an irrational choice of life path even for men with the skills you name such as Sail makers or carpenters.

And as you stated even women of that period was able to raised one way or another to high command positions from time to time in pirate society something that was not possible in almost any other area of life during that age.

Finally there is a long and very solid history of men being impress into service on warships and merchant men against their will throughout history and there is little evidence of that happening more when it concern pirate ships.

2 Replies

@hamburger,

hamburger wrote:

when the suez canal was blocked by the ships that were sunk in the canal , the merchant ships seemed to have little trouble going around the cape of good hope - and trade wasn't diminished from what i recall . perhaps the shipping companies need to wake up and consider that route again .
it won't solve the somalia problem ... so it's perhaps better to stick with the present route to keep reminding everyone of the REAL problem .
hbg

Perhaps you should give this interesting idea to "the shipping companies". It might be worthwhile to take a look at a globe and estimate the differential distance involved for a trip (say) from the Persian Gulf to Montreal.

Moreover, you should also consult a map of the Indian Ocean. the route from the Gulf of Aden or the Persian Gulf around the Cape of Good Hope parallels the Somali coastline for about 900 miles. Indeed many of the ships taken were sailing on this route.

hamburger wrote:

an interesting article from the BOSTON GLOBE re SOMALIA :

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2009/04/15/no_silver_bullet_for_somalia_problems/

that ends with this line :

Quote:
the real lesson we should take from this situation is that if we are going to effectively deal with the problem of "pirates gone wild" and the instability of the region, we need a comprehensive policy agenda rather than just stellar police action.

Charles R. Stith, a former US ambassador to Tanzania, is director of the African Presidential Archives and Research Center at Boston University

Chair bound sappy "thinkers" frequently prefer the development of a "comprehensive policy agenda" to constructive action. I suspect the 200 or so human beings taken from their ships and being held against their wills in Somalia might become a bit impatient with these efforts and other like excuses for inaction.

As others have noted, Somalia has been a poor, badly governed state for a very long time, and piracy is simply robbery and murder committed on the high seas. Your logic would justify virtually any crime by one who styled himself a member of an "impoverished" group.

Somalia in many respects is better off than some other nations that do not practice piracy. Moreover, several of the ships taken by the pirates were in the act of delivering food aid to the Somali people: the continuing piracy is a serious threat to the continuation of these shipments.

Traditional international law treated pirates as illegal guerillas who violated the laws of all nations - and subject to the jurisdiction of all. The new constructs being advocated by Europeans (and domestic critics of the U.S. policy with respect to terrorists) are themselves a radical departure from traditional international law. They make us all vulnerable to the worst criminals.

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@georgeob1,

I am all for dealing with the problem by sinking any small ships or boats with arm men found off that coast without warning and hopefully without survivors.

Drone aircrafts with hell fire missles from our naval warships should do the job nicely.

With the drome operators drinking coffee in a control room outside of Las Vegas.

Oh you do not need a boat load of men with AK-47 to go fishing so the chance of killing the wrong men would be small.

0 Replies

More high drama on high seas as France captures pirate ship

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