Somali pirates have hijacked yet another ship and are taking it and a French yacht with two French nationals on board to their remote coastal base, a regional government official said on Thursday.
Gunmen from the Horn of Africa nation are currently holding about 10 vessels for ransom at Eyl, a lawless former fishing outpost now used by gangs behind a sharp rise in attacks at sea.
”The pirates are sailing to Eyl with the French yacht and another Egyptian ship that they hijacked last night,” Hassan Muse Alore, the minister for minerals in northern Somalia’s Puntland region, told Reuters by telephone from Eyl.
He had no details on the Egyptian ship, but said he was visiting the area to check on reports that another of the hijacked vessels — an Iranian bulk carrier — had arms on board.
”We are now with local elders and still investigating the matter,” he said, without elaborating.
Heavily armed gangs have seized at least 30 vessels so far this year in the Gulf of Aden, making the shipping lanes between Somalia and Yemen the most dangerous in the world.
Late on Tuesday, pirates seized a French yacht with two French citizens on board, the French Foreign Ministry said.
It said a United Nations Security Council resolution in June gave France the right to pursue the pirates into Somali waters, but that it had to consider the best way to save the hostages.
In April, French commandos launched a helicopter raid to arrest six Somali pirates after they freed the 30-strong crew of a luxury yacht they had hijacked days earlier.
Somali pirates are demanding a ransom of more than $9-million to free two Malaysian tankers, a Japanese-managed bulk carrier and a Nigerian tug boat held captive near Eyl.
The authorities in semi-autonomous Puntland have been criticised for failing to crack down on the pirates, as well as money counterfeiters and kidnapping gangs on land.
But regional officials say the hefty ransoms paid out by ship owners are fuelling corruption and an explosion of piracy offshore that they are unable to contain.
”We have no power to control the multiplying numbers of pirates,” Ahmed Saed Ow-Nur, Puntland’s minister for fisheries and marine resources, said.
”Even some of the Puntland police are involved in piracy, because they can make a hell of a lot of money,” he said. — Reuters