TRANSPORT-CARIBBEAN: Shippers Face U.S. Security Demands

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Bert Wilkinson

GEORGETOWN, Guyana, May 21 2002 (IPS) - Caribbean shippers face costly U.S. demands to increase security at ports and marine facilities or risk lost business and other penalties.

The Caribbean Shipping Association (CSA) concluded semi-annual talks here Tuesday. Delegates said terrorism and security issues dominated discussion, especially in light of nascent U.S. legislation requiring tighter operations in the shipping industry and warnings from Washington over the weekend, about fresh potential for attacks against U.S. interests.

More than five million cargo containers head to the United States each year from the Caribbean.

Under U.S. legislation about to enter into force, maritime inspectors from the Department of Transportation would begin heading out to the region much like their counterparts from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) who look at airplanes and airports in the region.

Kim Petersen, executive director of the Fort Lauderdale, USA-based Maritime Security Council, warned that the Caribbean must tighten up security or face sanctions from the United States, including bans on ships entering U.S. sea ports from places that are categorised as unsafe.

“Quite clearly, while the U.S. can’t demand that any country accepts its standards, it will in fact have a fairly big stick with which to compel compliance,” said Petersen, who has several times testified in the U.S. Senate about port security around the world.

Petersen and CSA President Rawle Baddaloo said that while the region has accepted the need to become proactive about improving security, many ports in the Caribbean are still unsafe given today’s realities.

Of the 12 CSA members at the meetings here, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, and the Port of Miami, USA can be considered to be approaching acceptable levels of security, officials said. The others must move quickly to meet standards that could deal with current threats.

Said Baddaloo, nearly all ports in the Caribbean need to acquire high-tech electronic equipment to scan containers to be loaded on U.S.-bound ships. “These scanners cost at least 10 million dollars each and we would have to approach international lending agencies for help,” he added.

U.S. shipping sources said they also are concerned about the hundreds of cruise ship that call at ports in the Caribbean each year. Cruise ships bring more than 10 million tourists to the region each year, most of them from the United States and Europe.

Petersen said that al Qaeda documents retrieved by allied troops in Afghanistan indicate that sea ports and ships might provide the next source of attacks by terrorists.

“This is based on information from their own literature. We have to take it seriously,” said Petersen.

Among less costly steps agreed at this week’s talks, shippers agreed to immediately overhaul hiring practices to ensure that so-called terrorist “sleepers” and ex-convicts are not among their waterfront staff.

Passengers disembarking from the growing number of cruise ships plying Caribbean waters would be shepherded away from public places while on piers to ensure non-passengers do not slip into their ranks.

Security cameras and new lighting equipment would also be installed on ports deemed to be below standard.

Petersen said he remained confident terrorists would used the sea as their next line of attack given the difficulty of policing waters and the fact that only a small percentage of containers are inspected or scanned.

Before last September’s terrorist attacks in the United States, officials said, maritime security personnel were more concerned about ensuring that the Caribbean was not used as a transshipment point for South American-processed illegal drugs hitting the U.S. market. Today’s focus must now include international terrorism.

The security question is expected to spill over into discussions of several upcoming meetings of the Caribbean Tourism Organisation and the Caribbean Hotels Association.

These two organisations and Caribbean leaders have long lobbied against ships carrying nuclear waste from Japanese plants through the Caribbean to Europe. Now, officials say they plan to remind the international community that these, too, can be used as a tool of international terrorism.