Snowmail: Indian ocean anarchy
Updated on 17 November 2008
Somali pirates have claimed their biggest prize so far - an oil tanker with Saudi origins.
Now they've captured an oil-tanker. The Somali pirates who've been hijacking ships and ransoming them for millions have claimed their biggest prize so far.
This ship is apparently Saudi, though the foreign office has confirmed that a couple of Brits are on board. Reports are pretty hazy. At one point, it looked like the ship had been freed, but the latest report suggest it's being towed to a Somali port.
We report on the maritime anarchy that now prevails off the east coast of Africa, matched by the anarchy in Somalia itself where Islamist rebels are on the bring of taking control of Mogadishu, and the government is on its last legs.
How do you solve a problem like Guantanamo?
He has said it again, but more forcefully. Barack Obama wants to close Guantanamo almost as soon as he takes office. He has understood its scourge on the reputation of America, and he has coupled his commitment with a determination to end torture as well.
I have just been watching the Arabic service at al-Jazeera and, needless to say, Obama is all over it. America's face is already changing, even ahead of his taking office.
But having said that, how do you close Guantanamo? So much of it is so deeply illegal in international terms that clawing back any sense of legality in the treatment of people still held there is fraught with difficult.
Tonight we'll be reporting what he said and exploring how you export the people held there when their own countries don't want them back and when nobody's legal system is capable of giving them a fair trial.
Energy gap
The biggest ship ever to enter British waters docked off Kent this morning. She's carrying liquid gas and has thrown into sharp relief the reality that Britain's energy companies have been very slow to allow their charges to catch up with the true cost of raw energy.
Now, it's true that some electricity companies and others bought ahead. But the lag appears very great. The energy secretary, Ed Miliband, is attempting to get the companies to cut their prices faster. Siobhan Kennedy is on the case.
Organ donation
Organ donation is in the news. Contrary to expectations, the government-appointed task force charged with finding out whether we can or should change the law so that we have to opt out from a general acceptance that organs will be taken, wants to keep things as they are.
Tonight we'll be debating the issues and questioning whether faith groups, who are said to represent no more than 7 per cent of the population, played too prominent a part in the review.
Terror admission
The surviving terrorist - as I think we must now call him (that's what he calls himself) - from the attack on Glasgow airport, says that he meant to do what he did. We shall be reporting that and reviewing what effect his attack had on security in public places.
On the continuing furore surrounding the death of Baby P, we are talking tonight to someone who was a senior officer in Haringey social services at the time of the Victoria Climbie case and after. He has some particularly interesting things to say.
Hail to the cyber-chief
Finally back to the man with whom I began, Barack Obama. He is to be stripped of his Blackberry because it is neither secure nor are copies kept of the transmission (it's traditional for US presidents to have all their words as president recorded).
I suspect he will resist in order to become the first serious member of the cyber-informed presidency.
