Indian Ocean news update – Vanilla Islands step up surveillance amid security reviews

SEYCHELLES ASSURES VISITOR SAFETY AMIDST SECURITY REVIEW
The events in Kenya in recent days, when a remote beach resort half way between Lamu and the Somali border was attacked, a British tourist killed and his wife abducted but suspected Somali intruders, has reverberated across the Vanilla Islands, triggering an immediate review of their own respective security arrangements and boosting monitoring and surveillance to prevent any seaborne landings.
The Seychelles, already at the very heart of global anti piracy efforts, is also the base for US Army operated UAVs used to carry out aerial surveillance while fixed wing aircraft operate around the clock out of the Mahe International Airport to keep the extensive waters around the archipelago under constant watch.
A reliable source from Mahe in fact responded to an emailed question, saying that such scenarios have been at the core of the countrys defensive measures to keep the islands safe, and that the latest technology was being used to prevent any ship, boat or craft illegally nearing any of the inhabited islands without triggering a major response from coast guard and other security organs. .
The Minister of Home Affairs, the Hon. Joel Morgan, in an interview with this correspondent in May this year, also made it abundantly clear at the time that the government in Victoria was doing its utmost, with the generous support by friendly countries, to boost its defensive assets and improve joint surveillance and ocean monitoring alongside the naval coalition operating in the Indian Ocean, to keep the citizens and visitors safe at all times. While conceding that something of the sort could conceivably happen he was also swift to point out that all humanly possible was done to make sure it will not happen and that no expense was being spared to keep the Seychelles safe.
Along the East African coast line, from Kenya via Tanzania to Mozambique, have navies been put on a higher state of alert as is the case in the Comoros Islands and all the way to Madagascar and Mauritius, to where Somali pirates, aka ocean terrorists, have been maneuvering in search of targets. Watch this space.