Pirates in the English Channel?

Arrrgh!

there are reports of the possibility of links to russian mafia involvment - what would this be settled as if this is the case?

Chewwi,

Need to see how it plays out.... Basically, it is cat-eds JOB to settle things fairly.. Not sure what the clear definition is of a "pirate"... Good point / question though.. can you ask cat-ed?
I do not want to speak for anyone... I would think though, that if the "mafia" were crew members, it would likely settle as mutiny. If the mafia members were "outside" people (although they might have had an insider, it would be more like pirates).. Things are never black and white, unfortunately. Actually even "black and white" are often not black and white, with regard to human genetics too ..

Here, I think things are handled fairly. When I say here, I mean here.

Its got all the earmarks of the Taliban as former VP Cheney would say.

A missing ship with 15 Russian crew members on board has been spotted more than two weeks after it disappeared, unconfirmed reports say.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/low/europe/8202308.stm
The Arctic Sea had last been sighted in the Bay of Biscay on 30 July.

Reports citing local coastguards now suggest it has been seen some 400 nautical miles from the Cape Verde islands, off the coast of West Africa.

Russian navy ships have been searching for the 4,000-tonne Maltese-flagged vessel, which had been carrying timber.

Observers have suggested the ship was hijacked, possibly because of a Russian commercial dispute.

Following the reported sighting, a spokesman for the French defence ministry told the BBC that the Arctic Sea was thought to be in international waters.

The spokesman said his information came from the Cape Verde coastguard, who said the ship was outside their jurisdiction. He was unable to confirm the coastguard's report.

"It would seem that these acts, such as they have been reported, have nothing in common with 'traditional' acts of piracy or armed robbery at sea."
...
[More at the link...]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/15/AR2009081500739.html?hpid=moreheadlines

further news

France: missing cargo ship found near Cape Verde
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gE17YYHbGwpvQYilaHecDtSI_W2QD9A2PLS82
(AP) - 20 hours ago

PARIS — The French Defense Ministry says a Russian-manned cargo that vanished in the Atlantic last month has been found near Cape Verde.

Ministry spokesman Capt. Jerome Baroe says Cape Verde coast guards have confirmed the Arctic Sea was discovered Friday afternoon about 520 miles (840 kilometers) off the former Portuguese colony off the West African coast.

...
[More at the link...]

BBC News: 'Ransom demand' for missing ship...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8203210.stm

The ship's been found, of course, but it's still very unclear what happened to it. There are a number of complicating factors, including the fact that the Russian military has admitted intentionally lying about the ship's whereabouts. So, for now, we'll leave this one open...

http://en.rian.ru/russia/20090820/155866540.html
http://en.rian.ru/world/20090819/155857494.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/8206691.stm
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article6826093.ece

@ Sqlman: how much confirmation is needed to settle this? All official sources speak of hijacking and Piracy. Of course there are Rumours, but they have only been denied and I cant find 1 source that confirms them.

I've not seen a single credible settlement source state absolutely that the ship was actually hijacked. Many Western news sources use terms such as "alleged hijack" or "supposed hijack", and/or they put the word hijack in so-called irony quotes. The only sources stating it was hijacked seem to be Russian...and an increasing number of non-Russian sources are saying that it most definitely was not a hijacking.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/6170926/Arctic-Sea-was-carrying-missiles-to-Iran-new-report-suggests.html
http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=528931
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/stories/2009/09/10/1245c78faeac
...and so on, and so forth.

Since the market's set to run for another 8 weeks or so, I think we can safely let this run to see if any definitive news comes out. That is, if an outside investigation were to show that the ship had indeed been hijacked, we'd settle on option #1. If, OTOH, Russia were to admit that the hijacking story was bogus, or an investigation evidence proved that it was, this would settle on the final option.

After a short period of thought I do have to agree with you in all mentioned points. Sorry for the premature settlement request.

How though would you settle if there were no FURTHER solid news until settlement date?

We can't really say there are "no news" on this subject and other doesnt really fit either, as we do have a lot of sources saying that the ship was indeed hijacked by pirates.
Dont forget that they have even arrested the alleged hijackers..

Of course you are right, we still have 8 weeks to go, I am just asking this question before I wager more money, I am already like 100+k deep, so I'd rather have some clarity on this before going all broke :-)

Wow, cool story. Clearly it must have been like this: "However, if Israel had intended to intercept the cargo, why would they entrust such a sensitive task to a crew of motley Estonians with criminal records? One possible explanation is that the "interception" was actually carried out by a gang posing as Swedish policemen, who were reported to have briefly boarded the boat and interrogated the crew a couple of days before it was "hijacked". But in that case, what were the hijackers themselves after? " http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/estonia/6143608/Hijackers-of-Arctic-Sea-ghost-ship-in-murky-waters.html :)
And the Russian criminals were straw men who should get caught and will now get paid off by Mossad and won't face exceptionally long prison terms as probably Peres and Medvedev discussed in their meeting... Although pirates usually aren't employees of some agency, hijacking a ship still makes them pirates, right?

Indeed, very interesting! I wonder what will come out.

A Russian expert is being threatened for exposing this story- it gets even more interesting!
http://www.comcast.net/articles/news-world-europe/20090903/EU.Russia.Missing.Ship/

At the risk of throwing gas on the fire... may I request examples of what might qualify for "etc." vs "other"?

@ Ladylara - that piece of news is quite old and nothing new has come from it :-(
@ Valornhonor - heh, you should stop making sqlmans life hard. I am still wondering about the same thing... we might wanna look at the "definitions of the words "hijack" and "pirate"

Just in case we do not get any further news than what we have right now, what would this question settle on?!
From the reactions of the Cat-Mod I am pretty uncertain what answer I should wager on now that I do not expect more news to come out. Sorry to bother you all with this, but I'd rather know it before the question settles, so I could be able to pull some money back out of this Q.

Doesnt anyone want to get their hands dirty?

Whats ppls opinion on this?

1. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8332977.stm
This is a piece of personal opinion of the writer - There is no evidence for anything else than piracy. The only thing the author does is to find out that other theories are too flawed to be believed

2.http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8332977.stm

The Maltese-flagged, Russian-crewed ship was purportedly attacked by pirates in Swedish waters in July.

A Russian warship located it off West Africa in August and arrested eight alleged hijackers.
The boldness of the hijacking and the elaborate effort to recapture it prompted speculation that the ship was carrying missiles for Iran or Syria, but Russian officials dismissed the claims.

Two correct statements: 1. The only thing officially declared (eventho it might not be confirmed by sceptics) is that the ship was hijacked (in my understanding people who hijack ships and take them somewhere else than their original destination are pirates, no matter if they wanted to hijack a ship full of wood or full of arms)
2. All other "information" out there is mere speculation and there is no SOLID reason to believe this was not a hijacking. Yes the whole thing feels kind of fishy but I (might be because of my wagers) wonder why this should be settled on "not known" or "other" if there is no hard evidence that this was something bigger than a normal pirate hijacking.