When I was working, I had to deal with a family of Christian refugees from southern Sudan. The first thing I noticed in reviewing the records was that everyone was born on January 1. As there were six in the family, the odds against such a thing happening were astronomical. It turns out that they had no idea of their age. When they were in refugee camp, workers came through, did physical examinations, and estimated their ages from the exams. The workers arbritarily put down January 1 as the date of birth. There will be no way of knowing the pirate's actual age, nor does his mother know. Such a thing is just not important in that society. I suspect that the defense will attack the computation of age and the lack of proper procedure in his "arrest."
International law allows that pirates be tried by any country that is willing. It does not set policy as to how forces are to deal with them. I heard on the news last night that Canadians captured pirates that had attacked a non-Canadian ship after a seven-hour search. Though the Canadian government had sent its young men into harm's way, it did not allow them to turn over the pirates to a willing nation, nor did the Canadians decide to try the pirates, as international law allows, but let them go, since the pirates did not attack a Canadian ship. The Canadians have been very helpful to us and have done very brave things in the past, so it is even more disheartening that they have had such a turn of heart.
