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Britons on board tanker stormed by Somali pirates
Danny Brierley18.11.08
AN oil tanker seized by pirates today in the Red Sea has British crew aboard.
The Saudi-owned vessel is the biggest ship so far to be attacked by the pirates, who are believed to be Somalian, the US navy said.
As well as the British sailors the ship has crew from Croatia, the Philippines, Poland and Saudi Arabia.
The 319,000-tonne Sirius Star, thought to be carrying crude oil and owned by the Saudi shipping company Vela, was attacked 450 nautical miles south-east of Mombasa, Kenya.
The US Navy said the pirates were taking the supertanker to the Somali port of Eyl, which has become a haven for pirates and where a number of other ships are still being held.
The east coast of Africa is a major shipping route traversed by cargo ships en route to the Suez Canal, European ports in the Mediterranean and farther north.
Heavily armed Somali gunmen have seized more than 30 vessels so far this year, making the shipping lanes through the Gulf of Aden the most dangerous in the world.
Yesterday a Russian navy patrol boat scared off pirates who tried to capture a Saudi Arabian merchant ship, the Russian navy said. The warship Nyeustrashimy (Fearless) was escorting three other ships through the gulf when it received a signal from the Saudi vessel, Rabih, that it was under attack. It launched a patrol boat to intercept the pirates, reports said.
Last Wednesday the Royal Navy killed two Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden when they tried to capture a Danish ship. It is believed to be the first time the Navy has taken lives at sea since the Falklands war in 1982, and the first pirates it has killed in centuries.
Boats from HMS Cumberland were launched after a dhow refused to stop when it was identified as being involved in an earlier hijack attempt on a Danish ship. Two Somalis were killed by machinegun fire from the Navy boats.
Reader views (5)
The only solution to end Somali piracy is to support Somaliland Navy, and recognize Republic of Somaliland as an independent government, becuase Somaliland Navy know the Somali pirates very well, as long as they speak same language. Somaliland can establish as power in the region, as the Gulf of Aden is very important to International high sea.
Thanks
- Abdulaziz, none
Why dont the british government offer the Somalian pirates a council house in the uk?
- Kev, London
Why don't they give the crews of these ships some training and issue them with light arms? A few M16s are all that is necessary to sink these pirate boats. The piracy can only happen because the ships are utterly undefended. You take a ship worth (guessing) $100mil, load it up with $100mil worth of oil, and have it fly the flag of a country that can afford many millions of ransom money, and you put it off the coast of Somalia, what do you expect is going to happen?
A couple of M16s would turn these pirate boarding craft into swiss cheese. This probably could be solve with a few thousand dollars worth of training and weapons.
- Yankee, Los Angeles, California
Somalia has been devasted by civil war. Many people continued to make a living by fishing until the big trawlers came. The fishermen then turned to piracy. It reality nothing is simple and nothing is what it seems! Like the DRC a country that needs a lot of help as they are fundamentally decent people!
- Michael, London
Its always been the Navy's job to combat piracy on the high seas and was certainly in action against pirates on the China coast in the 20th century.
- Peter Haldane, London
