Somalia Coast News

Six crew members of a Sri Lankan fishing trawler hijacked by suspected Somali pirates have been rescued, Sri Lankan officials said on Monday.The hijacking on Sunday was the latest in a series of attacks that have fueled fears of a resurgence of Somali piracy in the Gulf of Aden and Red Sea waters after years without a successful raid.Pirates who caused chaos in the key waterways from 2008 to 2018 appear to be taking advantage of disorder caused by attacks on shipping by Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthi group.Authorities were informed of the incident by a second boat traveling with the trawler on Su

An Iranian sailor held hostage by Somali pirates for more than four years has been released with the help of the United Nations and a humanitarian group, Iran's Foreign Ministry said on Saturday.Ministry Spokesman Abbas Mousavi thanked the Hostage Support Partnership group, U.N. officials in Somalia, and authorities in Somalia's semi-autonomous Puntland and in Ethiopia for their help in winning the release of Mohammad Sharif Panahandeh, the state news agency IRNA said.Three Iranians sailors are still being held…

Security guards aboard a Hong Kong-flagged cargo ship repelled an attack by pirates in a gunbattle off Somalia's coast this week, the European naval force in the region said on Friday.It was only the second reported attempt by Somali pirates to seize a commercial ship this year, after a resurgence of attacks in 2017 following years of relative calm brought about by regular patrols of the European Union Naval Force (EUNAVOR).On Tuesday, pirates approached and opened fire at the Hong Kong-flagged MV KSL Sydney freighter 340 nautical miles off Somalia, but private security guards aboard the ship acted quickly to foil the attack, EUNAVOR said in a statement."Due to the application of BMP (best management practices) protection measures by the master…

A tanker with 19 crew members on board has docked at a port in Togo after going missing for over a week in a suspected hijacking off the West African coast, the crew's agency said on Friday.The Ialkani agency and the ship's managers lost communication with the Panama-registered Pantelena on August 14, when it was about 17 miles (27 km) from the port of Libreville, in Gabon.Two Russian nationals and 17 Georgians were aboard the vessel, a dual purpose oil or chemicals tanker managed by Athens-based Lotus Shipping. The company gave no further details on the cargo or crew."Our guys are alive and well. The ship is already in the port of Lome (Togo's capital) and soon representatives of our company will meet them…

Flames seen rising from vessel after blast; port residents believe vessel may be foreign. A huge explosion was heard from a ship off the coast of Somalia's Puntland region late on Monday and flames were seen rising from what might be a foreign vessel, an official in a nearby port said. "We heard (a) huge explosion and (saw) flame rising from the ship. I believe that the ship is foreign," Ali Shire, mayor of Puntland's port town of Alula, a pirate haven, told Reuters on Tuesday. It was not immediately clear whether the explosion was caused by an accident onboard the vessel or was triggered by pirate attackers. It was also not clear whether the vessel was still afloat or had sunk.

Somali security forces clashed with pirates early on Wednesday and freed nine seamen kidnapped on an Indian cargo ship this month, officials said. The pirates seized the dhow Al Kausar off Somalia's coast, part of a surge of attacks after years without a reported incident. The kidnappers took the crew onshore in central Galmudug state on Monday and clashed with troops two days later, the territory's minister for ports and sea transport, Burhan Warsame, said. "We rescued the nine crew and they are healthy and safe," he added. Hirsi Yusuf Barre, mayor of Galkayo town in the area, said the security forces attacked the gang after it tried to move the hostages into an area controlled by the militant group al Shabaab overnight.

Pirates off the coast of Somalia, who hijacked an oil tanker with eight Sri Lankan crew on board, are demanding a ransom for the release of the vessel, the EU Naval Force said. The pirates seized the Comoros-flagged Aris 13 tanker on Monday, the first such hijacking in the region since 2012, and took it to the port of Alula in the semi-autonomous northern region of Puntland. "The EU Naval Force ... has received positive confirmation from the master of ... Aris 13, that his ship and crew are currently being held captive by a number of suspected armed pirates in an anchorage off the north coast of Puntland, close to Alula," the force said in a statement late on Tuesday.

The EU anti-piracy operation in the Horn of Africa  region said that  Pirates are demanding a ransom for the release of the Comoros-flagged oil tanker Aris 13 seized off the coast of Somalia and the crew is being held captive, the AP reported. An EU naval force statement said the operation had finally made contact with the ship’s master, who confirmed that armed men were onboard the 1,800 dwt ship. The reported seizure Monday of the ship, which was the first such seizure of a large commercial vessel off Somalia since 2012, came as a surprise to the global shipping industry as patrols by the navies of NATO countries, as well as China, India and Iran, had suppressed Somali pirate hijackings for several years.

Somali pirates have freed 26 Asian sailors held captive in a small fishing village for more than four years since their ship was hijacked in the Indian Ocean, a government official said on Saturday. The sailors -- from China, the Philippines, Cambodia, Indonesia, Vietnam and Taiwan -- were seized close to the Seychelles in February 2012, a time when pirate attacks were a regular occurrence in waters linking Europe with Africa and Asia. "The crew is here (in Galkayo). They will be flown to the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, on Saturday," local mayor Hirsi Yusuf Barre, told Reuters. "The crew did not say if ransom was paid," he added. Barre said the ship's captain was killed in the hijacking…

Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines on Monday agreed to designate a transit corridor for commercial vessels crossing a maritime zone hit by a spate of hijackings by Islamist militants in the southern Philippines. Nearly 20 Indonesian and Malaysian tugboat crew have been kidnapped by the Abu Sayyaf militants this year, with Jakarta airing fears that the problem could reach levels seen off the coast of Somalia. Alarmed at the frequency of attacks, port authorities in some areas of Indonesia, particularly Kalimantan on the island of Borneo, have stopped issuing permits to ships taking coal to the southern Philippines. Indonesia is the world's largest thermal coal exporter and supplies 70 percent of the Philippines' coal imports.

Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines ministers to meet in Jakarta as up to 18 Indonesians, Malaysians held captive in Philippines. Indonesia fears piracy on a busy shipping route along its maritime border with the Philippines could hit levels seen in Somalia unless security is tightened, its chief security minister said on Thursday, following a spate of kidnappings. The route lies on major shipping arteries that analysts say carry $40 billion worth of cargo each year. It is taken by fully laden supertankers from the Indian Ocean that cannot use the crowded Malacca Strait. For the first time, concerns over rising maritime attacks by suspected Islamist militants are disrupting coal trade between the Southeast Asian neighbours…

HMAS Darwin’s boarding team has uncovered and seized a large weapons cache, following a boarding of a fishing vessel during their deployment to the Middle East Region as part of Operation MANITOU. Operating under Combined Task Force 150, responsible for counter-terrorism operations within the Middle East Region, Darwin intercepted the fishing vessel approximately 170 nautical miles (313 kilometres) off the coast of Oman to conduct a flag verification boarding. After assessing the vessel to be stateless, 1989 AK-47 assault rifles, 100 rocket propelled grenade launchers, 49 PKM general purpose machine guns, 39 PKM spare barrels and 20 60mm mortar tubes were seized from the vessel that was headed towards the Somalia coast.

Somali pirates have hijacked an Iranian fishing vessel with 15 crew members, a Somali official and a maritime expert said on Monday amid warnings that piracy might be making a comeback in the Indian Ocean. Although there are still occasional cases of sea attacks, piracy near Somalia's coast had largely subsided in the past three years, mainly due to shipping firms hiring private security details and the presence of international warships. The Iranian ship was taken on Sunday evening in waters off northern Somali city of Eyl, said Abdirizak Mohamed Dirir, director of the anti-piracy and seaport ministry in Puntland, a semi-autonomous region in Somalia. "Pirates hijacked an Iranian-flagged fishing vessel with its 15 crew from near Eyl," Dirir told Reuters.

Regional insurance brokerage and risk management company AAIB first to be granted license to operate in Somalia as economic opportunities drive demand. Regional specialist in broking, risk management and consultancy Anglo Arab Insurance Brokers (AAIB), has broadened its footprint, within the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region being the first international insurance broker to have been granted a licence to operate in Somalia. Formed in 2005 to focus exclusively on emerging markets…

Australia’s HMAS Newcastle provided medical treatment and evacuated two badly burned Filipino merchant seamen from a stricken oil tanker in the Somali Basin. The seamen from the Liberian registered Merchant Tanker Perla, were severely burned during a machinery fire which left the tanker powerless, adrift and vulnerable to pirate attack on June 7, 2013. Heavy seas required Newcastle’s embarked Sea Hawk helicopter to affect the rescue which winched a three-person medical team to Perla to treat and recover the seriously injured men shortly after dawn on June 8.

Sea piracy worldwide dropped 28 percent in the first quarter of the year as attacks fell sharply in Somalia’s waters thanks to international naval patrols. Pirate attacks intensified, however, in Nigeria and Indonesia. The number of worldwide attacks from January to March dipped to 102 from 142 cases in the same period in 2011, according to the International Maritime Bureau’s piracy reporting center in Kuala Lumpur. It also said 11 vessels were hijacked and 212 crew members taken hostage, compared with 18 ships seized and 344 people taken hostage a year earlier. In Somalia, there were 43 attacks, including nine vessel hijackings, compared with 97 attacks a year ago. The agency attributed the decline to “disruptive actions and pre-emptive strikes” by navies in the region.

Remarks by Andrew J. Shapiro, Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, given to the Center for American Progress in Washington, DC (March 27, 2012). Thank you for inviting me here today. I want to thank the Center for American Progress [CAP] for having me here to speak on the important subject of piracy off the Horn of Africa. CAP is a tremendous leader in developing new ideas and in approaching issues in new ways. I come here before you today to talk about an issue that the Obama administration has also had to approach in new and innovative ways. Despite the romantic notions surrounding piracy of previous centuries, modern day piracy represents a new and complex threat to the international community.

The EU Naval Force Flagship ESPS Patino located a Yemeni registered dhow that was suspected of being involved in acts of piracy off the Somali coast. The previous day a merchant vessel had reported that it had evaded an attack by two skiffs. As she was close by, ESPS Patino was tasked to investigate the scene, and when her helicopter arrived, it located a capsized skiff, with suspected pirates embarking onto the Yemini dhow. The dhow was confirmed as a suspected mother ship, previously observed at a pirate anchorage. Authorisation was given for a team from Patino to board the dhow.

Private security firms are storing their guns aboard floating armouries in international waters so ships that want armed guards for passage through pirate-infested waters can cut costs and escape laws limiting the import and export of weapons, according to an article in 'The Scotsman' newspaper. Storing guns on boats offshore took off as a business last year. Britain – where many of the operators are from – is investigating the legality of the practice. Floating armouries have become a viable business in the wake of increased security practices by the maritime industry, which has struggled for years to combat attacks by Somali pirates.

Jama Idle Ibrahim, a/k/a Jaamac Ciidle, pled guilty on September 8 to conspiracy to commit piracy under the law of nations and conspiracy to use a firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence, U.S. Attorney Ronald C. Machen Jr. and Shawn Henry, Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office, announced. The charges stem from a violent act of piracy in the Gulf of Aden against a merchant vessel, the MV/CEC Future, that began in November 2008. Ibrahim, 38, of Somalia, entered the guilty plea this morning before the Honorable Magistrate Judge Deborah A. Robinson in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. He faces a maximum penalty of five years in prison for the piracy conspiracy count and 20 years for the firearm conspiracy count.

An Indian Navy spokesperson said the MT Nordik Spirit, a Norway flag vessel, was attacked off the Somalia Coast by pirates firing small arms. The Indian Navy warship flew out helicopters with marine commandos and the pirates retreated. The incident occurred around 3 pm local time. (Source: The Times of India)

Piracy off Somalia’s coast is a symptom of wider problems ashore, and any strategy to tackle it must also deal with its root causes and strengthen regional capacity, the United Nations envoy to the country warned on Nov. 18. He noted that an increased maritime presence is helping to stabilize the situation on the sea but that the number of pirate attacks has not diminished. Between January and September, some 160 piracy incidents were reported in the East African area, with 34 ships being hijacked and more than 450 people taken hostage off the coast of Somalia, according to the UN International Maritime Organization (IMO). The IMO is steering the implementation of the Djibouti Code of Conduct…

According to a report from BBC News, the owner of a Thai fishing trawler has said the Indian navy sank it off Somalia's coast last week after wrongly assuming it was a pirate "mother ship". The vessel owner said one of the crew had been found alive after six days in the Gulf of Aden, but that another 14 were missing. The Indian navy has insisted the they fired in self-defense at a pirate ship which had been stacked with explosives. (Source: BBC News)