On 28 March 2019, a Maltese patrol vessel intercepted the Palau-flagged tanker vessel El Hiblu 1 (IMO: 9753258) at the outer limit of Malta’s territorial sea, and the ship was subsequently boarded and secured by a Maltese special operations team using a helicopter. The reason for this operation was that the El Hiblu 1 had allegedly been hijacked by members of a group of migrants it had rescued earlier, and that these migrants had forced the crew to steer the vessel towards Europe. It appears that no one was injured prior or during the operation. Afterwards, the El Hiblu 1 was brought to the port of Valletta. Reportedly, Maltese authorities have now charged three teenage migrants from Guinea and Côte d’Ivoire with “terrorist activities”.

Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini was quick to allege that the incident constituted “the first act of piracy on the high seas with migrants.” Equally, Maltese authorities reportedly at one point spoke of a “pirated ship” and so did the master of El Hiblu 1 according to his own account. The purpose of this post is to clarify that, based on the reported facts, the seizure El Hiblu 1 is not a case of piracy under the international law of the sea. Importantly, this post does not argue that no criminal conduct, for example under the law of the flag State, has taken place on the El Hiblu 1. Rather it shows that the incident does not provide Malta – or any other interested State – with universal jurisdiction under Article 105 of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) to try the persons involved for acts committed in relation to the incident.