Armed pirates are seen aboard the French yacht Tanit off Somalia in this undated handout. A French hostage was killed and four others were freed on Friday when French forces attacked pirates who had seized the yacht off Somalia, officials said April 10, 2009. REUTERS/Marine Nationale/Handout (FRANCE CONFLICT SOCIETY) FOR EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NOT FOR SALE FOR MARKETING OR ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS
Somali pirates hijack British ship
A British-owned cargo ship has been hijacked by Somali pirates.
Last Updated: 11:48AM BST 06 Apr 2009
The 183m-long Malaspina Castle is Italian-operated and flies a Panamanian flag.
The seizure of the vessel, which was built in 1981, is believed to have taken place in the Indian Ocean and is the latest in a series of incidents involving Somali pirates.
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"A 32,000-tonne bulker was seized early this morning. It is UK-owned but operated by Italians. The crew is mixed but we are not sure of their nationalities," said Andrew Mwangura of the Mombasa-based East African Seafarers' Assistance Programme.
Taiwanese ship the MV Win Far 161 was also seized today near an island in the Seychelles - the second attack in that area within a week.
The hijacking of the Taiwanese ship is the latest in a series of attacks in the Indian Ocean. Analysts say the pirates have moved many of their operations out of the Gulf of Aden, which is heavily patrolled by naval warships from countries as diverse as China, the United States, France and India. Instead, they are attacking off the east African coast, targeting ships coming out of the Mozambican channel.
The seizure of the Malaspina Castle was immediately condemned by the UK ship masters' union Nautilus, which has long urged governments to take stronger action to deter piracy.
Over the weekend a French yacht and a Yemeni tug were captured in separate incidents.
Nautilus assistant general secretary Mark Dickinson said today: "Over the last 10 years, most governments have not really done very much about this.
"More recently they have been motivated to act and there is an EU naval co-ordination force patrolling off the Gulf of Aden."
He went on: "I'm not sure that this is going to be a long-term thing and I'm also worried that the pirates will start seizing ships well away from the areas being patrolled.
"In Somalia, piracy is like a big, successful industry and the authorities there need to act. The pirates are treated like local heroes. People look up to them and girls want to marry them. They are seen by some locals as good people but they are ruthless."
A spokesman for the London-based International Maritime Organisation (IMO) said that the IMO had raised the matter of piracy with the UN security council and that East African countries had signed an agreement to work together to try to beat the problem.
A British cargo ship has been hijacked by Somali pirates.
The Malaspina Castle is Italian-operated and flies a Panamanian flag.
No details were given of the crew by government officials in Kenya who reported the attack.
A Taiwanese ship the MV Win Far 161 was also seized near an island in the Seychelles, the second attack in that area within a week.
The Taiwanese raid is the latest in a series of attacks in the Indian Ocean.
Analysts say the pirates have moved many of their operations out of the Gulf of Aden, which is heavily patrolled by naval warships from countries as diverse as China, the United States, France and India.
Instead, they are attacking off the east African coast, targeting ships coming out of the Mozambican channel.
The multimillion-dollar ransoms are a huge source of cash in Somalia, where nearly half the population is dependent on food aid and clan-based militias are tearing the country apart.
The lawless Horn of Africa nation has not had a functioning government since 1991.
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Today 08.04.09 at 07.30 local time Somali pirates were able to control a Danish-registered, US-flagged container ship with 20-21 US ‘seamen’ aboard. Our intelligence correspondent was able to conclude that the ship was one of scores of Maersk Ships hired by the Pentagon to carry weapons to Israel in order to replace the bombs and special ammunition used in Gaza and to friendly Somali elements. The seamen on such ships are former Navy Personnel or Israelis which must have been caught napping. It took the pirates six hours to be in final control of the ship. Usually, the pirates will settle for few $ millions in ransom. But what worries Obama administration is the possibility of Al-Qaeda involvement. If that was the case, a higher ransom will be demanded. Which may include the release of all Guantanamo detainees after handing them $one million each in compensation for the seven years in detention without trial. It seems that the US anti piracy task force, made of six ships and two planes, has failed, as 15 ships were seized during one month.
Warship nears Somali pirates holding U.S. captain
09 Apr 2009 07:01:39 GMT
Source: Reuters
* US navy destroyer Bainbridge reported arriving on scene
* Crew negotiates for release of captain
* Clinton urges world to end piracy "scourge"
(Recasts; adds details throughout)
By Daniel Wallis and JoAnne Allen
NAIROBI/WASHINGTON, April 9 (Reuters) - A U.S. navy destroyer reached waters off Somalia on Thursday to help free an American ship captain taken hostage by pirates in the first seizure of U.S. citizens by the increasingly bold sea gangs.
Gunmen briefly hijacked the 17,000-tonne Maersk Alabama freighter on Wednesday, but the 20 American crew retook control after a confrontation far out in the Indian Ocean where the pirates have captured another five vessels in a week.
Second mate Ken Quinn told CNN the pirates were holding the captain on the ship's lifeboat, and that the crew were trying to negotiate his release.
The Danish-owned freighter's operator, Maersk Line Ltd,
CNN said the lifeboat, with the captain and four pirates aboard, was within sight of the Alabama. But a regional maritime official said that might have changed.
"We are now getting reports the Alabama is moving towards safe waters," Andrew Mwangura, coordinator of the Kenya-based East African Seafarers' Assistance Programme, told Reuters.
"But we don't know what happened to the master, whether the pirates took him away or returned him safely aboard the ship."
The attack was the latest in a sharp escalation in piracy in the waters off lawless Somalia, where heavily armed sea gangs hijacked dozens of vessels last year, took hundreds of sailors hostage and extracted millions of dollars in ransoms.
The long-running phenomenon has disrupted shipping in the strategic Gulf of Aden and busy Indian Ocean waterways, increased insurance costs, and made some firms send their cargos round South Africa instead of the Suez Canal.
The upsurge in attacks makes a mockery of an unprecedented international naval effort against the pirates, including ships from Europe, the United States, China, Japan and others.
"The solution to the problem, as ever, is the political situation in Somalia," said analyst Jim Wilson, of Lloyds Register-Fairplay, referring to the 18-year civil conflict.
"Until there is peace on land there will be piracy at sea."
CREW TIE UP PIRATE
Maersk said its crew regained control of the Alabama on Wednesday after the pirates left the huge ship with one hostage. It could not confirm whether that captive was the captain.
Maersk spokesman B.J. Talley said no injuries had been reported among the crew members left on board the freighter.
CNN said the Alabama crew could see the Bainbridge and had been in contact with the Navy. A U.S. defence official in Washington would say only there were U.S. assets in the area.
The U.S. Fifth Fleet in Bahrain referred all media enquiries on Thursday to the Pentagon.
The ship was carrying thousands of tonnes of food aid destined for Somalia and Uganda from Djibouti to Mombasa, Kenya, when it was attacked about 300 miles (500 km) off Somalia.
"We are just trying to offer them whatever we can, food, but it is not working too good," Quinn told CNN of efforts to secure their captain's release. He said the four pirates sank their own boat after they boarded the Alabama.
But then the captain talked the gunmen into the ship's lifeboat with him. The crew overpowered one of the pirates and sought to exchange him for the captain, Quinn told CNN.
"We kept him for 12 hours. We tied him up," Quinn said. They freed their captive, he added, but the exchange did not work.
Somali gunmen captured a British-owned ship on Monday after hijacking another three vessels over the weekend.
"We think the world must come together to end the scourge of piracy," U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told reporters in Washington, saying she was following the saga closely.
U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry said a thorough policy debate on Somali piracy was long overdue.
"I plan to hold hearings to further examine the growing threat of piracy and all the policy options that need to be on the table before the next fire drill becomes an international incident with big implications," Kerry said in a statement. (Additional reporting by Edward McAllister, Anthony Boadle, Jim Wolf, JoAnne Allen and Sue Pleming in Washington and Rasmus Jorgensen in Copenhagen; Writing by Daniel Wallis and Anthony Boadle; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne)
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FBI hostage negotiators head to pirate standoff
AP
Maersk: Priority is abducted captain's return Play Video AP – Maersk: Priority is abducted captain's return
* Somali Pirates Slideshow:Somali Pirates
* Navy Destroyer to the Rescue Play Video Video:Navy Destroyer to the Rescue ABC News
* Hostage at High Seas Play Video Video:Hostage at High Seas ABC News
In this Jan 10, 2008 photo released by the U.S. Navy, the Arleigh Burke-class AP – In this Jan 10, 2008 photo released by the U.S. Navy, the Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer …
By ELIZABETH A. KENNEDY, Associated Press Writer Elizabeth A. Kennedy, Associated Press Writer – 13 mins ago
NAIROBI, Kenya – The United States called in FBI hostage negotiators and a U.S. destroyer kept close watch on a lifeboat where Somali pirates held an American ship captain Thursday, a day after the bandits hijacked a U.S.-flagged vessel before being overpowered.
The pirates took Capt. Richard Phillips as a hostage as they escaped the Maersk Alabama into the lifeboat in the first such attack on American sailors in around 200 years. Negotiations were believed to be under way, a relative of the captain said, but it was not clear who was conducting them.
At the FBI, spokesman Richard Kolko described the bureau's hostage rescue team as "fully engaged" with the military in strategizing ways to retrieve the ship's captain and secure the Maersk Alabama and its roughly 20-person U.S. crew.
Kevin Speers, a spokesman for the ship company Maersk, said the pirates have made no demands yet to the company. He said the safe return of the abducted captain is now its top priority.
The USS Bainbridge had arrived off the Horn of Africa near where the pirates were floating near the Maersk, he said.
"It's on the scene at this point," Speers said of the Bainbridge, adding that the lifeboat holding the pirates and the captain is out of fuel.
"The boat is dead in the water," he told AP Radio. "It's floating near the Alabama. It's my understanding that it's floating freely."
The U.S. Navy has sent up P-3 Orion surveillance aircraft and has video footage of the scene.
One senior Pentagon official, speaking on grounds of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, described the incident now as a "somewhat of a standoff."
Though officials declined to say how close the Bainbridge is to the site, one official said of the pirates: "They can see it with their eyes." He spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of talking about a military operation in progress.
The Bainbridge was among several U.S. ships that had been patrolling in the region when the 17,000-ton U.S.-flagged cargo ship and its 20 crew were captured Wednesday.
On Thursday, Somalia's foreign minister said the pirates "cannot win" against American forces.
"The pirates are playing with fire and have got themselves into a situation where they have to extricate themselves because there is no way they can win," Somali Foreign Minister Mohamed Omaar told The Associated Press.
Meanwhile, Phillips' family was gathered at his Vermont farmhouse, anxiously watching news reports and taking telephone calls from the U.S. State Department to learn if he would be freed.
"We are on pins and needles," said Gina Coggio, 29, half-sister of Phillips' wife, Andrea, as she stood on the porch of his one-story house Wednesday in a light snow. "I know the crew has been in touch with their own family members, and we're hoping we'll hear from Richard soon."
Phillips surrendered himself to the pirates to secure the safety of the crew, Coggio said.
"What I understand is that he offered himself as the hostage," she said. "That is what he would do. It's just who he is and his response as a captain."
Coggio said she believed there were negotiations under way, although she did not specify between whom.
Ken Quinn, a crew member aboard the ship, was frustrated to learn that he would be traveling in waters off Africa instead of along safer routes around Asia or the Middle East, his wife said Thursday.
"He knew he was going into all the pirates," Zoya Quinn said in a telephone interview from her home in Florida. "He was worried but he told me not to worry because those pirates never got an American ship."
With one warship nearby and more on the way, piracy expert Roger Middleton from London-based think tank Chatham House said the pirates were facing difficult choices.
"The pirates are in a very, very tight corner," Middleton said. "They've got only one guy, they've got nowhere to hide him, they've got no way to defend themselves effectively against the military who are on the way and they are hundreds of miles from Somalia."
The pirates would probably try to get to a mothership, he said, one of the larger vessels that tow the pirates' speedboats out to sea and resupply them as they lie in wait for prey. But they also would be aware that if they try to take Phillips to Somalia, they might be intercepted. And if they hand him over, they would almost certainly be arrested.
Other analysts say the U.S. will be reluctant to use force as long as one of its citizens remains hostage. French commandos, for example, have mounted two military operations against pirates once the ransom had been paid and its citizens were safe.
The Maersk Alabama, en route to neighboring Kenya and loaded with relief aid, was attacked about 380 miles (610 kilometers) east of the Somali capital of Mogadishu. It was the sixth vessel seized in a week.
Many of the pirates have shifted their operations down the Somali coastline from the Gulf of Aden to escape naval warship patrols, which had some success in preventing attacks last year.
International attention focused on Somali pirates last year after the audacious hijackings of an arms shipment and a Saudi oil supertanker. Currently warships from more than a dozen nations are patrolling off the Somali coast but analysts say the multimillion-dollar ransoms paid out by companies ensure piracy in war-ravaged, impoverished Somalia will not disappear.
The attacks often beg the question of why ship owners do not arm their crew to fend off attacks. Much of the problem lies with the cargo. The Saudi supertanker, for example, was loaded with 2 million barrels of oil. The vapor from that cargo was highly flammable; a spark from the firing of a gun could cause an explosion.
There is also the problem of keeping the pirates off the ships — once they're on board, they will very likely fight back and people will die.
Pirates travel in open skiffs with outboard engines, working with larger ships that tow them far out to sea. They use satellite navigational and communications equipment, and have an intimate knowledge of local waters, clambering aboard commercial vessels with ladders and grappling hooks.
Any blip on an unwary ship's radar screens, alerting the crew to nearby vessels, is likely to be mistaken for fishing trawlers or any number of smaller, non-threatening ships that take to the seas every day.
It helps that the pirates' prey are usually massive, slow-moving ships. By the time anyone notices, pirates will have grappled their way onto the ship, brandishing AK-47s.
___
Associated Press writers Pauline Jelinek in Washington, Katharine Houreld in Nairobi, Kenya, Jennifer Kay in Miami and John Curran in Underhill, Vermont, contributed to this report.
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Navy Continues Delicate Dance With Pirates
FBI Negotiating For Release Of American Captain As Pirates, Hostage Lay Adrift In Indian Ocean
Comments Comments 178
NAIROBI, Kenya, April 9, 2009
17,000-ton container ship Maersk Alabama
This undated image made available in London, Wednesday April 8, 2009 by Maersk Line, shows the 17,000-ton container ship Maersk Alabama, when it was operating under the name Maersk Alva, which has been hijacked by Somalia pirates with 20 crew members aboard while sailing from Salalah in Oman to the Kenyan port of Mombassa via Djibouti. (AP Photo/Maersk Line)
Warships are speeding to the scene of a pirate attack in the Indian Ocean. The American crew regained control of the ship, but the hijackers held the ship's captain hostage. David Martin reports.
Pirates Hijack U.S. Ship (2:30)
* A crew member aboard the Maersk Alabama tells CBS News about his cargo ship being hijacked by Somali pirates and how the captain was held hostage.
Crew Member On Hostage Crisis (0:30)
* The capture of a U.S. cargo ship is hardly the first to be taken hostage by Somali pirates. As Richard Roth reports, their motives are simple, demanding cash and creating anarchy.
Who Are The Pirates? (1:38)
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* Hostage Captain's Family Holds Tense Vigil
* Somali Pirates Are Back, Seizing 5 Ships
(CBS/AP) The piracy crisis over a lone hostage in the Indian Ocean took on the familiar air of a cops-and-robbers standoff, with the U.S. Navy seeking advice Thursday from seasoned FBI negotiators.
Their goal: Resolve the incident without military force.
As the FBI joined the delicate negotiations, President Barack Obama, facing one of his first national security tests, declined comment when asked about the standoff. Vice President Joe Biden said the administration was working "round the clock" on the problem.
Attorney General Eric Holder said "we'll obviously do what we have to do to make sure that the maritime life of this nation is protected."
The incident epitomizes the limits of U.S. power in an age of increasing threat from violence-minded, faceless groups and individuals.
FBI spokesman Richard Kolko said the bureau's hostage negotiating team as "fully engaged" with the military in strategizing ways to retrieve the ship's captain and secure the Maersk Alabama and its roughly 20-person U.S. crew.
The FBI was summoned as the Pentagon substantially stepped up its monitoring of the hostage standoff, sending in P-3 Orion surveillance aircraft and other equipment and securing video footage of the scene.
The pirates were still holding the 55-year-old Phillips, from Underhill, Vt., after the American crew retook the ship Wednesday and the hostage-takers fled into the lifeboat. Hostage negotiators and military officials have been working around the clock to free Phillips.
Meanwhile, the Maersk Alabama is en route to Mombasa, Kenya with a security detail of 18 Navy personnel on board, reports CBS News national security correspondent David Martin.
The USS Bainbridge remains in visual contact with the lifeboat carrying Phillips and officials are in communication with the pirates, reports Martin.
A second U.S. Navy ship, the guided missile frigate Halliburton, which is equipped with helicopters, is also on its way to the scene, reports Martin.
The FBI is considered the negotiating arm of the U.S. government for international incidents. The crisis negotiation team has been dispatched to more than 100 incidents worldwide since 1990, according to the bureau. The unit, whose motto is "resolution through dialogue" is based at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Va., about 40 miles south of Washington.
(CBS)
"We're deeply concerned and we're following it very closely," Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said. "More generally, the world must come together to end the scourge of piracy."
The pirate-hostage drama was the first of its kind in modern history involving a U.S. crew.
"We have watched with alarm the increasing threat of piracy," said Denis McDonough, a senior foreign policy adviser at the White House. "The administration has an intense interest in the security of navigation."
The Bainbridge was among several U.S. ships, including the cruiser USS Gettysburg, that had been patrolling in the region. But they were about 345 miles and several hours away when the Maersk Alabama was seized, officials said.
The Obama administration has so far done no better than its predecessor to thwart the growing threat of piracy. Since January, pirates have staged 66 attacks, and they are still holding 14 ships and 260 crew members as hostages, according to the International Maritime Bureau, a watchdog group based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
There is too much area to cover and too many commercial vessels to protect for full-time patrols or escorts. U.S. legal authority is limited, even in the case of American hostages and a cargo of donated American food. And the pirates, emboldened by fat ransoms, have little reason to fear being caught.
"The military component here is always going to be marginal," said Peter Chalk, an expert on maritime national security at the private Rand Corp.
According to the Navy, it would take 61 ships to control the shipping route in the Gulf of Aden, which is just a fraction of the 1.1 million square miles where the pirates have operated. A U.S.-backed international anti-piracy coalition currently has 12 to 16 ships patrolling the region at any one time.
Along the Somali coastline, an area roughly as long as the Eastern Seaboard of the United States, pirate crews have successfully held commercial ships hostage for days or weeks until they are ransomed. In the past week, pressured by naval actions off Somalia, the pirates have shifted their operations farther out into the Indian Ocean, expanding the crisis.
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Pirates with U.S. hostage vow to fight if attacked
The U.S. Navy destroyer Bainbridge
Somali pirates holding an Ameican hostage on a drifting lifeboat vowed today to fight any attack by U.S. naval forces stalking them on the high seas.
"We are not afraid of the Americans," one of the pirates told Reuters by satellite phone on behalf of the gang holding ship captain Richard Phillips in the Indian Ocean.
"We will defend ourselves if attacked."
Despite their defiant talk, maritime groups tracking the saga -- the first time Somali pirates have captured an American -- say a more likely outcome is a negotiated solution, possibly involving safe passage in exchange for their captive.
Four pirates have been holding Phillips, a former Boston taxi driver, since Wednesday after a foiled bid to hijack the 17,000-tonne Maersk Alabama several hundred miles off Somalia.
The ship's lifeboat has run out of fuel, other pirates are too nervous to help them due to the presence of foreign naval ships, and the USS Bainbridge destroyer is up close.
"Other pirates want to come and help their friends, but that would be like sentencing themselves to death," said Andrew Mwangura, coordinator of the East African Seafarers' Assistance Programme that monitors the region's seas.
"They will release the captain, I think, maybe today or tomorrow, but in exchange for something. Maybe some payment or compensation, and definitely free passage back home."
Phillips is one of about 270 hostages being held at the moment by Somali pirates, who have been plying the busy sea-lanes of the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean for years.
They are keeping 18 captured vessels at or near lairs on the Somali coast -- five of them taken since the weekend alone.
Yet the fact Phillips is the first U.S. citizen seized, and the drama of his 20-man American crew stopping the Alabama being hijacked on Wednesday, has galvanised world attention.
It has also given President Barack Obama another foreign policy problem in a place most Americans would rather forget.
Perched on the Horn of Africa across from the Middle East, Somalia has suffered 18 years of civil conflict since warlords toppled former dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.
Americans remember with a shudder the disastrous U.S.-U.N. intervention there soon after, including the infamous "Black Hawk Down" battle in 1993 when 18 U.S. troops were killed in a 17-hour firefight that later inspired a book and a movie.
U.S. SENDS MORE SHIPS
In another Somali-American saga, Captain Phillips apparently volunteered to get in the lifeboat with the pirates on Wednesday to act as a hostage for the sake of the Alabama's 20 American crew members, who somehow retook control of their ship.
The freighter, which is carrying food aid for Uganda and Somalia, is now on its way to its original destination, Mombasa port in Kenya. It is expected to arrive by Sunday night.
Pirate sources in Somalia told Reuters they had sent two boats full of armed men to help their colleagues on the lifeboat. The two boats were staying far apart, to help evade patrols, but were nervous of approaching due to the naval ships.
The USS Bainbridge has called on the FBI and other U.S. officials to help negotiate with the pirates.
U.S. military officials said more forces were on the way and that all options were on the table to save the captain.
"We're definitely sending more ships down to the area," a defence official told Reuters. He said one of the ships would be the USS Halyburton, a guided missile frigate that has two helicopters on board.
Last year saw an unprecedented number of hijackings off Somalia -- 42 in total. That disrupted shipping, delayed food aid to east Africa, increased insurance costs, and persuaded some firms to send cargoes round South Africa instead of through the Suez Canal, a critical route for oil.
It also brought a massive international response, with ships from the United States, Europe, China, Japan and others flocking to the region to protect the sea-routes.
As the patrols mainly focused on the Gulf of Aden, the gateway to the Suez, the pirates began moving further afield and have been striking as far south as Indian Ocean waters near the Seychelles and Madagascar.
Analysts say the attack on the Alabama could lead to a new phase in international efforts to stop piracy.
"Piracy may be a centuries-old crime, but we are working to bring an appropriate, 21st-century response," U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said.
With a vast area for the pirates to roam in, however, analysts say the only real solution is peace and stable government in Somalia itself.
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Somali pirate attack foiled by water-hoses - NATO
11 Apr 2009 11:56:35 GMT
Source: Reuters
ON BOARD NRB CORTE-REAL, April 11 (Reuters) - Somali pirates attacked a 26,000-tonne, Panama-flagged bulk carrier in the Gulf of Aden on Saturday, but were driven away by sailors spraying them with water-hoses, NATO alliance staff said.
The NATO officials, on board a Portuguese warship protecting shipping lanes from piracy, said an unexploded rocket-propelled grenade landed in the commanding officer's cabin during the attack and bullets were fired at the ship.
The pirates left after water hoses were turned on them, NATO staff officer Stephan Gresmak said. "They looked for an easier target," he told a Reuters reporter on the Portuguese ship. (Reporting by Alison Bevege, Writing by Andrew Cawthorne)
Pirates seize U.S.-owned, Italy-flagged tugboat
11 Apr 2009 13:49:03 GMT
Source: Reuters
NAIROBI, April 11 (Reuters) - Pirates seized a U.S.-owned and Italian-flagged tugboat with 16 crew on Saturday in the latest hijacking in the busy Gulf of Aden waterway, a regional maritime group said.
Andrew Mwangura, of the Mombasa-based East African Seafarers' Assistance Programme, said the crew were believed to be unharmed on the tugboat, which he added was operated from the United Arab Emirates.
(Reporting by Andrew Cawthorne)
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Somali pirates in German ship fail to find comrades
11 Apr 2009 12:25:49 GMT
Source: Reuters
(For full coverage of the pirate crisis, click on [nPIRATES])
* Pirates sailing German ship fail to find comrades
* Attack on another ship repelled by water-hoses
* France frees yacht; one hostage killed, four rescued
* Somali elders plan mediation mission
By Abdi Guled
MOGADISHU, April 11 (Reuters) - Pirates on a German ship with 24 foreign hostages said on Saturday they had returned to the Somali coast after failing to locate the scene of a standoff involving an American captive on a drifting lifeboat.
The pirates had hoped to use the hijacked 20,000-tonne container vessel, Hansa Stavanger, as a "shield" to reach fellow pirates holding American ship captain Richard Phillips far out in the Indian Ocean. U.S. naval ships are close to the lifeboat.
"We have come back to Haradheere coast. We could not locate the lifeboat," one pirate on the German ship, who identified himself as Suleiman, told Reuters.
The German ship was seized off south Somalia between Kenya and the Seychelles and has a crew of 24.
Somali elders and relatives of pirates holding Phillips are planning a mediation mission, a regional maritime group said.
"They are just looking to arrange safe passage for the pirates, no ransom," the group's coordinator Andrew Mwangura told Reuters.
Separately, French special forces stormed a yacht held by pirates elsewhere in the lawless stretch of the Indian Ocean in an assault that killed one hostage, but freed four.
Two pirates were killed and three captured.
On Saturday, NATO staff said pirates had attacked a Panama-flagged bulk carrier in the Gulf of Aden between Somalia and Yemen.
An unexploded rocket-propelled grenade had landed in the commanding officer's cabin and bullets were fired at the ship before it repelled the attack with water-hoses, said the officials, aboard a Portuguese warship in the area.
More U.S. warships have been sent towards the lifeboat drifting in international waters off Somalia, where pirates have been holding Phillips since trying to hijack his ship, the 17,000-tonne, Danish-owned Maersk Alabama, on Wednesday.
The American captain's relatives have said he volunteered to get in the lifeboat with the pirates in exchange for the safety of his crew, who regained control of the Maersk Alabama.
The ship, carrying food relief to Kenya, was due into Kenya's Mombasa port at around 5 p.m. (1400 GMT) on Saturday. U.S. officials said there was unlikely to be access to the crew. At one point, Phillips tried to escape the lifeboat by jumping overboard, but was quickly recaptured.
Close by, the destroyer USS Bainbridge launched monitoring drones and kept radio contact with the pirates. A U.S. official said it was seeking a peaceful outcome and FBI experts were helping.
OTHER HOSTAGES
Phillips is one of about 250 hostages being held by Somali pirates preying on the busy sea lanes of the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean.
There are more Filipinos than any other nationality and the pirates are keeping about 16 captured vessels at or near lairs like Eyl, Hobyo and Haradheere on Somalia's eastern coast -- five of them taken in the last week alone.
The fact Phillips is the first U.S. citizen seized has galvanised intense world attention.
"Once again, it has taken American involvement to get world powers really interested," said a diplomat who tracks Somalia from Nairobi. "I hope they don't forget the Filipinos and all the others, once this guy is released."
The standoff has also forced U.S. President Barack Obama to focus on a place most Americans would rather forget. Perched on the Horn of Africa, Somalia has suffered 18 years of conflict since warlords toppled dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.
Americans remember with a shudder the disastrous U.S.-U.N. intervention there soon after, including the infamous "Black Hawk Down" battle in 1993 when 18 U.S. troops were killed in a 17-hour firefight that was later made into a hit movie.
DEFIANT
The pirate gang holding Phillips remained defiant despite the arrival of U.S. and other naval ships in the area.
"We will defend ourselves if attacked," one told Reuters by satellite phone. The pirates are demanding $2 million for his release and a guarantee of their own safety, a pirate source said.
Somalia's Islamist insurgent movement al Shabaab, which is on Washington's list of terrorist organisations, lambasted the international naval patrols and said no money should be paid.
"You are the ones who are the pirates. Leave our waters. You will be defeated, whatever you can do. And you will regret anything you pay as a ransom," al Shabaab spokesman Sheikh Muktar Robow Mansoor told reporters.
Al Shabaab has denied any links with the pirates.
Officials in Washington confirmed reinforcements were nearby, listing the frigate USS Halyburton, equipped with guided missiles and helicopters, and a German frigate.
The USS Boxer, an amphibious assault ship, was also on its way, mainly in case its medical facilities were required.
In France, the government stood by its raid to free the yacht, which was hijacked en route to Zanzibar last weekend with two couples and a 3-year-old child aboard.
"During the operation, a hostage sadly died," said French President Nicolas Sarkozy's office. But it said the president "confirms France's determination not to give in to blackmail and to defeat the pirates." [ID:nLA581500]
Last year there were 42 ship hijackings off Somalia, which disrupted shipping, delayed food aid to East Africa and raised insurance costs. Some cargo ships have been diverted to travel around South Africa instead of through the Suez Canal. (Additional reporting by Abdi Sheikh and Mohamed Ahmed in Mogadishu, Abdiqani Hassan in Bosasso, Daniel Wallis in Mombasa, Alison Bevege on board the NRB Corte-Real, Andrew Gray and Anthony Boadle in Washington, William Maclean in London and Andrew Cawthorne in Nairobi; writing by Andrew Cawthorne; editing by Philippa Fletcher)
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Commercial ships don't have navy seamen unless they are on a Pentagon mission. The Pentagon does hire scores of ships from Maersk to carry out weapons besides some humanitarian supplies for a cover. As it turned out in the case of Maersk Albama, all the crew members were US Navy-trained crew.
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Helicopters fly over Somali pirate lairs
12 Apr 2009 07:37:12 GMT
Source: Reuters
(adds quotes)
MOGADISHU, April 12 (Reuters) - Helicopters flew over a coastal area used by Somali pirates on Sunday, causing panic among residents who feared an air raid, witnesses said.
Locals said they could see white soldiers on one of two helicopters which flew over for around half an hour in the area of Haradheere port on Somalia's Indian Ocean coast.
They said they believed the helicopters came from nearby U.S. or other foreign warships monitoring a standoff over an American hostage held by pirates on a lifeboat.
"We woke with loud sounds of helicopters flying over Haradheere," resident Hassan Jimale told Reuters. "We could see the legs and faces of soldiers as the helicopter flew low. Maybe they are monitoring the sea or pirates planning to reinforce those on the lifeboat."
Another resident, Ahmed Haji Abdi, said locals were afraid of being bombed. "We thought there would be air raids this morning. Haradheere is full of pirates," he said.
"They might be Americans. They have left now."
Pirates have various bases around Haradheere, and are holding some hijacked vessels in the area. (Reporting by Abdi Guled and Ibrahim Mohamed, writing by Andrew Cawthorne, editing by Jack Kimball)
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Hijacked Italian boat reaches Somali coast - group
12 Apr 2009 10:08:57 GMT
Source: Reuters
(Adds details)
NAIROBI, April 12 (Reuters) - Somali pirates have taken a hijacked Italian tugboat with 16 foreign crew to the Horn of Africa nation's coast but not yet demanded a ransom, a regional maritime group said on Sunday.
The boat was seized on Saturday in the Gulf of Aden with 10 Italians, five Romanians and one Croatian on board.
"She has reached the shore, but we don't know where," said Andrew Mwangura, of the East African Seafarers Association which tracks piracy in the region. "They have not made any demands."
NATO officials on a Portuguese warship in the region said they saw a distress call from the MV Buccaneer tugboat, but lost communications minutes later.
Somali pirates, who make millions in ransoms, have stepped up attacks on the vital Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean waterways in March after a lull at the beginning of this year.
International attention has focused on the plight of an American ship captain taken by pirates on a lifeboat last week.
(Reporting and writing by Jack Kimball)
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Warships track U.S. hostage floating to Somalia
12 Apr 2009 14:58:01 GMT
Source: Reuters
(For more coverage of the pirate crisis click on [nPIRATES]
* Lifeboat holding captain drifts toward Somalia
* Helicopters fly over pirate lair
* Hijacked Italian tugboat reaches shore
By Abdi Sheikh and Abdi Guled
MOGADISHU, April 12 (Reuters) - Military helicopters flew over Somali pirate lairs and battleships stalked a boat on Sunday in which gunmen were holding an American hostage in a five-day high seas standoff.
Armed with assault rifles and a grenade launcher, four pirates and their captive, 53-year-old U.S. ship captain Richard Phillips, were drifting towards land on a lifeboat out of fuel.
Three U.S. warships were watching the situation.
"The captain must be tied to the lifeboat because he tried to escape once," Aweys Ali Said, chairman of the pirate-infested central Somali region of Galkayo, told Reuters.
Pirate sources said U.S. helicopters were dropping supplies for the boat. Phillips is the first American taken captive by Somali pirate gangs who have marauded in the busy Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean shipping lanes for years.
"The Americans give them food and water -- helicopters drop them on the lifeboat," a pirate from Hobyo village, who identified himself as Hussein, told Reuters.
U.S. officials are anxious to end the standoff, which has gripped Americans since Wednesday when Phillips -- a saxophone-playing, sports-loving father-of-two who lives in rural Vermont -- was taken hostage.
U.S. Navy spotters saw Phillips on Sunday morning, ship owner Maersk Line said in a statement, without giving further details.
Officials expect the pirates will try to escape with him if they reach the shore of the Horn of Africa nation, where 18 years of civil conflict has fuelled piracy offshore.
The U.S.-flagged Maersk Alabama container ship was attacked far out in the Indian Ocean on Wednesday, but its 20 American crew apparently fought off the pirates and regained control.
"HERO" CAPTAIN
Relatives said Phillips volunteered to go with the pirates in a Maersk Alabama lifeboat in exchange for the crew.
"The captain is a hero," one crew member shouted from the 17,000-ton ship as it docked in Kenya's Mombasa port under darkness on Saturday. "He saved our lives by giving himself up."
Experts had expected a quick end to the standoff, but the pirates are holding out for both a ransom and safe passage home. Friends told Reuters the gang wants $2 million.
Somali elders, who wield big sway their clan-based society and often negotiate solutions to kidnaps, say they have sent a mediator to sea with the aim of securing safe passage for Phillips' release, and no ransom.
The saga has thrown world attention on the long-running piracy phenomenon off Somalia that has hiked shipping insurance costs and disrupted international trade.
Phillips is just one of about 260 hostages -- the majority, 92, Filipino -- being held by pirates who have targetted vessels from oil tankers to luxury yachts.
They hold about 17 vessels, six taken in the last week.
U.S. officials said the lifeboat had drifted to within 20 miles of the Somali coast but pirate sources and a regional maritime group said it was still much further out. The state of negotiations was unclear, with U.S. officials tight-lipped and the pirates on the lifeboat shouting abuse at journalists who call their satellite phone.
Military officials said the pirates fired on a U.S. craft that approached them from the USS Bainbridge on Saturday. No one was hurt and the craft withdrew.
Helicopters, probably from the nearby U.S. or other foreign warships, also flew over a coastal area used by pirates on Sunday. It was unclear if the two choppers were sent to intimidate the gangs or as some step in a mediation process.
Residents said they could see white soldiers on one of the helicopters which flew over for around half an hour in the area of Haradheere port. One briefly landed.
BAD MEMORIES
Resident Ahmed Haji Abdi said people were afraid of being bombed. "We thought there would be air raids this morning. Haradheere is full of pirates," he said.
The standoff has forced U.S. President Barack Obama to focus on a place most Americans would rather forget.
A U.S. intervention in Somalia in the early 1990s was a disaster, including the "Black Hawk Down" battle in 1993 that killed 18 U.S. troops and inspired a book and a movie.
FBI officials are helping negotiations with the pirates and were also searching the Maersk Alabama for clues.
A hijacked Italian tugboat with 16 foreign crew -- 10 Italians, five Romanians and a Croatian -- reached the Somali coast on Sunday. It was seized on Saturday in the Gulf of ADen.
Somalia's fledgling government appealed for international help, saying piracy could only be stopped by peace on land.
"It's clear the varieties of international forces that have come to the waters of Somalia are not able to resolve the issue," Foreign Minister Mohamed Abdullahi Omaar told Reuters.
"We are talking about one million square kilometres of sea, the size of Spain."
(Additional reporting by Abdi Sheikh and Ibrahim Mohamed in Mogadishu, Jack Kimball, Andrew Cawthorne and Abdiaziz Hassan in Nairobi)
(Writing by Andrew Cawthorne and Angus MacSwan)
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U.S. captain held by Somali pirates freed-US Navy
12 Apr 2009 18:30:27 GMT
Source: Reuters
(For more coverage of the pirate crisis click on [nPIRATES]
* U.S. captain freed - U.S. navy
* CNN reports three of four pirates killed
* Expert predicts piracy may become more violent (Adds ship owner statement, details)
By Abdi Sheikh and Abdi Guled
MOGADISHU, April 12 (Reuters) - U.S. cargo ship captain Richard Phillips has been freed from captivity at the hands of Somali pirates in a dramatic ending to a five-day standoff with American naval forces, the U.S. Navy said on Sunday.
U.S. television channel CNN said Phillips was freed unharmed and that the U.S. military killed three of four pirates who had held him hostage on a lifeboat after trying to seize his vessel. It said a fourth pirate was in custody.
"I can tell you that he is free and that he is safe," Navy Lieutenant Commander John Daniels said. He had no information on how the rescue happened or the physical condition of the captain of the U.S.-flagged Maersk Alabama container ship.
Maersk said it received word of Phillips' rescue from the U.S. Navy at 1330 EDT (1730 GMT) and informed the jubilant crew of the Alabama.
"We are all absolutely thrilled to learn that Richard is safe and will be reunited with his family," Maersk Line chief executive John Reinhart said in a statement.
Phillips, 53, was the first American taken captive by Somali pirate gangs who have marauded in the busy Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean shipping lanes for years.
Three U.S. warships had been watching the situation.
U.S. Navy spotters saw Phillips on Sunday morning, ship owner Maersk Line said in a statement.
The Maersk Alabama, a container carrying food aid for Somalians, was attacked far out in the Indian Ocean on Wednesday, but its 20 American crew apparently fought off the pirates and regained control.
Relatives said Phillips volunteered to go with the pirates in a Maersk Alabama lifeboat in exchange for the crew.
Joseph Murphy, whose son, Shane, was Phillips's second in command and took over the Alabama after pirates left with Phillips, said in a statement read by CNN, "Our prayers have been answered on this Easter Sunday."
"My son and our family will forever be indebted to Capt. Phillips for his bravery. If not for his incredible personal sacrifice, this kidnapping -- an act of terror -- could have turned out much worse," said Murphy.
"The captain is a hero," one crew member shouted from the 17,000-ton ship as it docked in Kenya's Mombasa port under darkness on Saturday. "He saved our lives by giving himself up."
RANSOM AND SAFE PASSAGE
Experts had expected a quick end to the standoff, but the pirates were holding out for both a ransom and safe passage home. Friends told Reuters the gang wanted $2 million.
The saga has thrown world attention on the long-running piracy phenomenon off Somalia that has hiked shipping insurance costs and disrupted international trade.
Andrew Mwangura, coordinator of Mombasa-based East African Seafarers Assistance Program, said the rescue appeared to be the work of frogmen and the feat would change the stakes in future pirate attacks.
"This is a big wake-up to the pirates. It raises the stakes. Now they may be more violent, like the pirates of old," he said.
Pirates have generally treated hostages well, sometimes roasting goat meat for them and even passing phones round so they can call loved-ones. The worst violence reported has been the occasional beating. No hostages are known to have been killed by pirates. (Additional reporting by David Morgan in Washington, Abdi Sheikh and Ibrahim Mohamed in Mogadishu, Jack Kimball, Andrew Cawthorne and Abdiaziz Hassan in Nairobi; Editing by Doina Chaicu)
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Pirates threaten revenge on US after rescue
Posted: 13 April 2009 1736 hrs
Photos 1 of 1
Richard Phillips (R) stands alongside Frank Castellano, commanding officer of USS Bainbridge, after being rescued
MOGADISHU : A Somali pirate chief on Monday threatened to target Americans in revenge for the rescue of a US captain in a dramatic operation that saw military snipers kill his captors after a five-day standoff.
After the rescue on Sunday evening, the head of the pirate group that had held the American hostage aboard a lifeboat told AFP they had agreed to free him without ransom before the US navy took action.
"The American liars have killed our friends after they agreed to free the hostage without ransom, but I tell you that this matter will lead to retaliation and we will hunt down particularly American citizens travelling our waters," Abdi Garad said by phone from the pirate lair of Eyl.
"We will intensify our attacks even reaching very far away from Somalia waters, and next time we get American citizens... they (should) expect no mercy from us."
Captain Richard Phillips, who commanded the Maersk Alabama cargo ship, was rescued when snipers took aim at the pirates Sunday evening and after President Barack Obama approved the use of force to save him, the US navy said.
He was in good condition after being held hostage for five days in the lifeboat from the Maersk Alabama after the ship's American crew on Wednesday fought off the pirates' attempt to capture the freighter.
Navy snipers hidden in the rear of the USS Bainbridge, one of two navy warships that rushed to the scene, shot and killed the pirates, said Vice Admiral Bill Gortney, commander of US naval forces in the region.
The pirates "were pointing the AK-47s at the captain," who was tied up, Gortney said.
Obama had given orders to "take decisive action" if Phillips was at risk at any time, Gortney said.
The snipers fired when they had one of the pirates in their sights "and two pirates with their head and shoulders exposed," Gortney said.
At the time the USS Bainbridge, a guided missile destroyer, was towing the lifeboat to calmer waters and was some 25 to 30 meters (82 to 98 feet) ahead of the boat.
According to CNN, the snipers were earlier brought in by helicopter and dropped into the water behind the Bainbridge.
The fourth pirate had surrendered, Gortney said, adding that the US Department of Justice was "working out the details" on how and where to prosecute him.
US media described the surviving pirate as possibly being 16 years old.
Although the US government's policy is to not negotiate with pirates, Gortney acknowledged that US officials engaged in a "deliberate hostage negotiation process" with the pirate aboard the USS Bainbridge.
Phillips was taken aboard the USS Bainbridge then flown to the assault ship USS Boxer. He called his family in the United States and received a medical checkup.
In Washington, Obama -- who had been publicly silent on the hostage crisis -- said in a statement that he was "very pleased" with Phillips' rescue, calling it "a welcome relief to his family and his crew."
The United States was resolved to combat piracy off Somalia, Obama said.
Maersk spokeswoman Alison McColl, speaking in Phillips' hometown of Underhill, Vermont, said the captain's wife, Andrea, found her husband in good spirits on the phone.
The 20-crew Maersk Alabama had been bound for Mombasa, Kenya, carrying aid for the UN World Food Program, an agency official told AFP.
It docked safely in the Kenyan port Saturday and crew members celebrated after hearing of their captain's rescue, shouting and popping open champagne bottles.
The US operation came two days after French commandos stormed a yacht where other Somali pirates were holding two French couples and a child. The child's father was killed in the operation, while the other four hostages were freed.
Garad, the pirate chief, said the pirates had dropped their ransom demand for the American and asked for him to be moved onto a Greek ship that had been hijacked by the group.
Mohamed Dualeh, an elder who had been involved in efforts to end the standoff, said the pirates had been "foolish to insist on getting another ship for transfer and all contacts with the American officials were dropped in the afternoon after the standoff intensified."
A Somali government spokesman hailed the operation.
"I hope this operation will be a lesson for other pirates holding the hostages on the ships they hijacked," Abdulkadir Walayo told AFP.
Somali pirates have recently intensified their attacks, and another group was manoeuvring an Italian tugboat and its 16-member crew towards the Somali coastline after it was hijacked Saturday, pirate sources said.
- AFP/vm
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Somali pirates hijack freighte
Tuesday 14th April, 03:28 PM JST
NAIROBI —
Two maritime security contractors say Somali pirates hijacked a freighter in the Gulf of Aden overnight.
They say the M.V. Irene E.M. is the latest target of pirates who appear undeterred by U.S. and French navy attacks that killed seven bandits in the past week to free four hostages. That includes the weekend’s dramatic rescue of the American captain of a U.S. freighter.
The contractors did not know the ship’s owner or where it is licensed. They spoke on condition of anonymity on Tuesday because it is a sensitive security issue.
The Irene is at least the third vessel hijacked in a week. The nighttime attack indicates increased technology acquired by pirates who win multimillion-dollar ransoms.
Meanwhile, U.S. President Barack Obama vowed Monday “to halt the rise of piracy,” while shipmates of the rescued American freighter captain called for tough action against Somali bandits who are preying on one of the world’s busiest sea routes.
Obama appeared to move up the piracy issue on his agenda, saying the United States would work with nations elsewhere in the world.
Obama said at a Washington news conference.
“I want to be very clear that we are resolved to halt the rise of piracy in that region and to achieve that goal, we’re going to have to continue to work with our partners to prevent future attacks,”
The nighttime rescue operation of Richard Phillips won praise abroad but it was uncertain how far Obama wanted to go to engage the pirates.
The U.S. was considering options including adding Navy gunships along the Somali coastline and launching a campaign to disable pirate “mother ships,” according to military officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because no decisions have been made.
Some military strategists believe it may ultimately be necessary to attack the pirates’ bases on land in Somalia. But few international allies have the appetite for another land operation in Somalia, where a U.S. military foray in the early 1990s ended in humiliation. And the cost in civilian casualties would likely be extremely high, some warn.
“That would be nuts,” said Larry Johnson, a former CIA agent and State Department counterterrorism specialist. “These people are not organized into any military force, they are intermingled with women and children. You’re talking about wiping out villages.”
The chief mate aboard the US-flagged Maersk Alabama was among those urging strong U.S. action.
“It’s time for us to step in and put an end to this crisis,” Shane Murphy said. “It’s a crisis. Wake up.”
In Burlington, Vt, Phillips’ wife, Andrea Phillips made a tearful public appearance, her first since the Sunday rescue of her husband. She thanked Obama, who approved the dramatic sniper operation that killed the pirates holding him.
“You have no idea, but with Richard saved, you all just gave me the best Easter ever,” she said in a statement read by the family’s spokeswoman.
On the other side of the world, the 19 crew members on the Alabama celebrated their skipper’s freedom with beer and an evening barbecue in an area cordoned off from journalists, said crewman Ken Quinn, who ventured out holding a Tusker beer — a popular brew in Kenya, where the ship was docked.
On Tuesday morning, the crew left the cargo ship and checked into a hotel in the Kenyan resort city of Mombasa. It was not immediately clear how long the crew was planning to stay. Some crew have said they would return home soon, probably by air.
New details emerged Monday about the standoff.
Fearing the pirates’ lifeboat was approaching the Somali shore, where they could escape, the Bainbridge rammed it back out toward sea, said a spokesman for Vice Adm. Bill Gortney, commander of the Navy’s Fifth Fleet. That happened before the Bainbridge put a tow line on the lifeboat to help it navigate the choppy sea.
The four pirates that attacked the Alabama were between 17 and 19 years old, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said.
“Untrained teenagers with heavy weapons,” Gates told a group of students and faculty at the Marine Corps War College. “Everybody in the room knows the consequences of that.”
U.S. officials were now considering whether to bring the fourth pirate, who surrendered shortly before the sniper shootings, to the United States or possibly turn him over to Kenya. If he is brought to the U.S., he’d most likely be put on trial in New York or Washington.
Both piracy and hostage-taking carry life prison sentences under U.S. law.
That pirate had surrendered to seek medical attention. He was stabbed with an ice pick during a scuffle with the crew when the pirates initially tried to overtake the Alabama, a senior military official said.
The American ship had been carrying food aid bound for Rwanda, Somalia and Uganda when the ordeal began Wednesday hundreds of miles off Somalia’s eastern coast. As the pirates clambered aboard and shot in the air, Phillips told his crew to lock themselves in a cabin and surrendered himself to safeguard his men.
Phillips was then taken hostage in an enclosed lifeboat that was soon shadowed by three U.S. warships and a helicopter. Navy SEAL snipers parachuted from their aircraft into the sea, and were picked up by the USS Bainbridge, a senior U.S. official said.
U.S. Defense officials said snipers got the go-ahead to fire after one pirate held an AK-47 close to Phillips’ back. The military officials asked not to be named because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the case.
Snipers killed three pirates with single shots shortly after sailors on the Bainbridge saw the hostage-takers “with their heads and shoulders exposed,” Gortney said.
It was not immediately known when or how Phillips would return home.
Pirates hold some 230 foreign sailors still held hostage in more than a dozen ships anchored off lawless Somalia.
Vilma de Guzman worried about her husband, one of 23 Filipino sailors held hostage since Nov. 10 on the chemical tanker MT Stolt Strength.
“The pirates might vent their anger on them,” she said. “Those released are lucky, but what about those who remain captive?”
___
Jelinek reported from Washington. Associated Press writers who contributed to this report include Mohamed Olad Hassan in Mogadishu, Somalia; Michelle Faul, Malkhadir M. Muhumed and Tom Maliti in Kenya; Lara Jakes, Anne Gearan and Devlin Barrett in Washington; and John Curran in Burlington, Vt.
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Somali pirates hijack Greek-owned ship
14 Apr 2009 11:00:44 GMT
Source: Reuters
* Gunmen launch night attack on Greek bulk carrier
* Maritime group says 22 Filipino crew unharmed
* Canadian warship sends helicopter to scene
(Adds details, analyst, background)
By Alison Bevege
ON BOARD NRP CORTE-REAL, April 14 (Reuters) - Somali pirates hijacked a Greek-owned ship on Tuesday in a rare night attack that showed their determination to continue striking shipping in the area's strategic waterways.
The brazen capture of the MV Irene E.M. was a clear sign the sea gangs had not been deterred by two raids in recent days by U.S. and French special forces that killed five pirates.
NATO Lieutenant Commander Alexandre Fernandes said the Portuguese warship NRP Corte-Real had received a distress call from the St. Vincent and the Grenadines-flagged bulk carrier as it travelled through the Gulf of Aden.
"There was only three minutes between the alarm and the hijack," Fernandes told Reuters aboard the warship.
"They attacked at night, which was very unusual. They were using the moonlight as it's still quite bright."
The Greek merchant marine ministry said the Irene E.M.'s 22 crew members were all Filipinos. The vessel was sailing from Jordan to India when it was attacked. Its Piraeus-based owners were not immediately available for comment.
Heavily armed gunmen from lawless Somalia have run amok through the busy Indian Ocean shipping lanes and strategic Gulf of Aden, capturing dozens of vessels, hundreds of hostages and making off with millions of dollars in ransoms.
Until there is political stability onshore, experts warn, attacks on shipping will continue off its coast.
"Piracy is far more complex than any naval patrol," said U.S. analyst J. Peter Pham, of Madison University. "It will require more than just the application of force to uproot piracy from the soil of Somalia."
SPECIAL FORCES
NATO officials said a Canadian warship had sent a helicopter to scout out what was happening on the Irene E.M.
"There are hostages so now we will shadow and monitor the situation," Fernandes said.
Foreign navies are patrolling the seas off Somalia. But the pirates have continued to evade capture, driving up insurance costs and defying the world's most powerful militaries.
U.S. Navy snipers on a U.S. destroyer freed an American ship captain on Sunday by killing three Somali pirates holding him hostage in a lifeboat, ending a five-day standoff. Two more pirates died on Friday when French commandos stormed a yacht that had been seized. A French hostage was also killed.
Some fear the bloody assaults by Washington and Paris to free their hostages may raise the risk of future bloodshed. The pirates have vowed to take revenge on U.S. and French citizens.
So far, the sea gangs have generally treated captives well in the hope of fetching big ransom payouts. Piracy is lucrative in chaotic Somalia, where the brigands armed with assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenade launchers have thrived.
Many poor and unemployed young Somalis see the gangs as a dazzling alternative to their hard lives, given the quick money to be made. Most of the groups are based in villages and small towns along Somalia's long coast like Eyl, Hobyo and Haradheere.
Last year, the gunmen grabbed headlines with the world's largest sea hijack -- a Saudi Arabian supertanker carrying $100 million of crude oil -- and the seizure of a Ukrainian ship with a huge military cargo including 33 Soviet-era tanks.
But out of the international limelight, they have been striking regularly for years. They still hold about 260 other hostages, including nearly 100 Filipinos, on 17 captured ships.
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This undated photo shows the Greek-managed bulk carrier MV Irene E.M., which was hijacked by Somalian pirates in the Gulf of Aden during the early hours of Tuesday.This undated photo shows the Greek-managed bulk carrier MV Irene E.M., which was hijacked by Somalian pirates in the Gulf of Aden during the early hours of Tuesday. (Roberto Smera/Associated Press)
Somalian pirates seized two more ships and reportedly fired on another vessel on Tuesday in the dangerous waters off the Horn of Africa, bringing the total of ships seized to four in the last two days.
The pirates' actions are seen as a brazen response to recent U.S. and French military rescue operations that killed five of their colleagues.
NATO spokeswoman Shona Lowe said the Lebanese-owned MV Sea Horse was attacked Tuesday off Somalia's coast by pirates in three or four speedboats. She had no further details.
Meanwhile, Reuters quoted another NATO official as saying 10 pirates on board three skiffs fired automatic rifles and rocket-propelled grenades at the Liberian-flagged 21,887-tonne Safmarine Asia.
There was no immediate word of any casualties in either incident.
Earlier Tuesday, the Greek-managed bulk carrier MV Irene E.M. was sailing in the Gulf of Aden from the Middle East to South Asia when it was raided, said Noel Choong, who heads the International Maritime Bureau's piracy reporting centre in Kuala Lumpur.
A Canadian warship in the region, HMCS Winnipeg, sent a helicopter to monitor the situation after receiving a distress signal from the vessel, a NATO spokesperson said.
By the time the helicopter arrived on the scene, the MV Irene E.M. was already in control of the pirates, the spokesman said.
The vessel reportedly has as many as 23 crew, whose condition was unknown.
The latest seizure came a day after Egypt's Foreign Ministry said Somalian pirates took control of two Egyptian fishing boats with as many as 24 people on board.
Piracy a 'crisis': rescued crew member
While piracy has been a scourge for years on vessels using shipping lanes off the Somalian coast, the pirates vowed this week to exact their revenge on U.S. and French ships in the dangerous waters after the rescue operations.
On Sunday, U.S. navy SEAL snipers rescued American ship Capt. Richard Phillips on Sunday by killing three young pirates who had been holding him captive in a drifting lifeboat. A fourth pirate surrendered to a U.S. naval vessel tailing the lifeboat before the dramatic rescue.
Phillips's vessel, the Maersk Alabama, was taken by the pirates five days earlier after he surrendered himself in exchange for the safety of his 19-member crew.
As Phillips's crew celebrated his freedom on Tuesday, the vessel's chief mate urged strong U.S. action against piracy.
"It's time for us to step in and put an end to this crisis," Shane Murphy said. "It's a crisis. Wake up."
The freed captain and crew were due to be reunited with their families and loved ones in the United States on Wednesday, Maersk said.
In a separate rescue last week, French commandos stormed a yacht to free two French couples and a three-year-old child, killing two of their Somalian captors and one of the adult hostages.
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Somali pirates may be doubling as people smugglers - Feature
Posted : Thu, 16 Apr 2009 18:06:00 GMT
Author : DPA
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Aden/Sanaa - Traffic is busy in the Gulf of Aden these days. The waterway, between the Arabian Peninsula and Horn of Africa, is used by merchant ships having to pass through the Suez Canal. It is also infested by Somali pirates - who typically strike in small, highly manoeuvrable speedboats - and patrolled by formidable, anti-piracy warships from many nations.
But hardly anyone takes note of the overloaded little boats of smugglers who, night after night, take Africans fleeing civil strife and poverty across the Gulf of Aden to Yemen.
Many ship captains look the other way when they see the refugee boats, which are often barely seaworthy. This accommodates the pirates, who have begun to use the refugees as human shields.
"We now have signs there are links between the pirates and people smugglers," said Nabil Othman, deputy representative in Yemen of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
An encounter in the Gulf of Aden on March 21 has strongly fuelled suspicion of such links. A French warship came across a fully overloaded and unmanoeuvrable boat carrying about 100 people, which it towed to the Yemeni port of Aden. When the refugees all moved at the same time to one side upon disembarking, the boat capsized and eight people drowned.
Survivors subsequently identified four of those on board as Somali people smugglers. But weapons found later in the boat indicate that the smugglers, who had charged the refugees a lot of money for the illegal crossing, are also pirates.
"There are now Somalis who do double business on the crossing," said a Somali who has lived in Aden for decades. "First they bring refugees to Yemen, and on the way back they attack a ship."
When Yislam Othman Mohammed, a 31-year-old Somali from Mogadishu, got off a boat in Yemen in February 1992, the illegal crossing cost 50 US dollars. Today the price is about four times higher.
A tall man with a long goatee, Mohammed lives hand-to-mouth with his wife and two children in Aden. He washes cars in front of a food store while their owners shop. "In Somalia there's no hope," he said.
Sitting with her small children in the sun next to the store was Aischa Abu Bakr, a 30-year-old Somali. She was begging. Her face was hidden by a black yashmak, and her year-old daughter was sleeping in her lap. When a Yemeni gave her money, four other women and eight adolescents suddenly appeared and surrounded the benefactor.
"May God protect you! Give me something! Have mercy," one of the women cried.
Almost all of the refugees who risk their lives on the perilous passage across the Gulf of Aden, a three-to-five-day journey, come from civil war-torn Somalia or from Ethiopia.
Most of them later leave Yemen and try to cross the desert illegally to seek work in Saudi Arabia or Oman. No one knows how many perish en route.
Some 51,000 boat refugees arrived in Yemen in 2008, according to the UNHCR. The number this year has already reached 17,963. The UNHCR said 53 Somalis and 49 Ethiopians had been found dead on the beach, and that 14 refugees had died at sea.
"Those are only the refugees we know of," Othman pointed out. "The total may be two or three times higher."
Somali refugees are generally allowed to remain in Yemen, while most of the Ethiopians are repatriated if caught. "Somalia has become a jungle," remarked Othman, who said he did not expect the stream of refugees across the Gulf of Aden to subside anytime soon.
Meanwhile, the people smugglers in Somalia, where entire police units and many former naval officers have joined the pirates' ranks, are doing their best to crank up demand for their services. They make short promotional films to counter the occasional television pictures of drowned boat refugees.
The films show Somalis living in beautiful apartments and driving nice cars in places like Saudi Arabia and Dubai.
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Somali gunmen demand $1 mln for aid workers
20 Apr 2009 10:07:41 GMT
Source: Reuters
(Adds MSF comment, details)
By Ibrahim Mohamed
MOGADISHU, April 20 (Reuters) - Gunmen have demanded a $1 million ransom for the release of three aid workers taken over the weekend, a local elder told Reuters on Monday.
Somalia is one of the world's most dangerous places for aid workers and is suffering one of the world's worst humanitarian emergencies, with 3 million people dependent on food aid.
Attacks on relief organisations, normally blamed on Islamist rebels or clan militias, have forced groups to scale back on humanitarian operations.
"We came back this morning with empty hands," said local elder Aden Isak Ali from Rabdhure town, near where gunmen seized a medical team from the charity MSF-Belgium.
"The gunmen who hijacked MSF aid workers told us this morning that they will only release the foreign workers if they are given one million U.S. dollars as ransom," he said.
MSF in Brussels confirmed on Monday two male doctors from Belgium and Holland had been kidnapped. A local MSF worker said a Somali employee was also taken.
"We have witness confirmation that they have been kidnapped," an MSF official said.
In a separate attack, masked gunmen killed a former local employee of CARE International in the central town of Merka at the weekend. The charity suspended all activities in south-central Somalia late last year due to threats.
Fighting in Somalia over the last two years has uprooted more than one million people. The nation has been mired in civil strife since the 1991 overthrow of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre. (Additional reporting by Brussels bureau; Writing by Jack Kimball; Editing by Louise Ireland)
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Somali pirates free German ship after $1.8mn ransom
BOSASSO ( 2009-07-18 19:55:45 ) :Somali pirates fired in the air in jubilation after receiving a $1.8 million ransom in exchange for the release of a German owned vessel and its 11-member crew, pirate sources and officials said on Saturday.
"We have taken $1.8 million ransom and released the German ship,"pirate Ahmed told Reuters.
The 146 metre MV Victoria, an Antigua and Barbuda flagged cargo vessel, was hijacked by eight pirates in the Gulf of Aden on May 5 while on its way to the port of Jeddah.
A German foreign ministry official confirmed the Victoria's release.
The East African Seafarers' Assistance Programme said eleven Romanian crew were well, and the vessel was being monitored by aircraft as it made its way North from Somalia.
Somali sea gangs, operating in the strategic shipping lanes linking Asia and Europe, have made millions of dollars in ransom from hijacking vessels in the Indian Ocean and Gulf of Aden.
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