| Submit your comments on this article |
| Africa: Horn |
| WFP ship carrying tsunami aid hijacked off Somalia amid new piracy alerts |
| 2005-06-30 |
| Somalia: Anus of the planet. NAIROBI (AFP) - A UN-chartered vessel carrying aid for Somali tsunami victims has been hijacked off the coast of Somalia amid a flurry of new piracy warnings for the area, the World Food Programme (WFP) said. The freighter hauling 850 tonnes of Japanese and German food aid was seized by unidentified pirates on Monday between Haradhere and Hobyo, about 300 kilometers (185 miles) northeast of Mogadishu, it said in a statement. "It is against international humanitarian law to hinder the passage of humanitarian assistance and there is no justification for hijacking," the WFP said. The WFP country director for Somalia, Robert Hauser, appealed for the immediate release of the ship, its 10-member crew and the food aid and urged "local authorities and community elders to intervene in this regard." The Japanese- and German-donated rice was donated in response to a WFP appeal for assistance to some 28,000 Somalis affected by the December 26, 2004 tsunami that devastated countries around the Indian Ocean. Warlords must be hungry. The ship, the St Vincent and the Grenadines-registered MV Semlow, had been on its way from the Kenyan port of Mombasa to Bossaso in Somalia's northeast Puntland region when it fell afoul of the pirates in waters deemed highly unsafe by international maritime agencies. Both the International Maritime Board (IMB), a division of the International Chamber of Commerce, and the United States have issued a series of increasingly dire alerts about threats to shipping off the east and northeast Somali coasts. Earlier this month, the IMB warned of a surge in piracy in the region and advised vessels not making calls in the region to stay at least 50 miles (85 kilometers), and preferably further away, from the coast of the lawless nation. The WFP hijacking was the sixth reported piracy incident in Somali waters since March, which included one earlier this month in which a US naval destroyer intervened to save a besieged vessel. All five earlier incidents have involved armed pirates who, in at least two cases, took crews hostage. Before Monday, the last reported attack took place on June 6 off Mogadishu when three gunmen in a white speedboat opened fire with automatic weapons on a bulk carrier identified as the Tigris, according to the IMB. The USS Gonzalez, a US naval ship in the area, responded to the vessel's distress call, came close, fired flares and .50-caliber machine guns and escorted the carrier further out to sea, it said. There were "no injuries to crew but gunfire by pirates caused 10 bullet holes on the starboard side near the bridge," the IMB said in a brief description of the incident. In March, the United States advised western shipping firms of possible speedboat-launched terrorist attacks on vessels in the Indian Ocean off the coast of east Africa, including Somali waters. |
| Posted by:tu3031 |
| #6 ...in which a US naval destroyer intervened to save a besieged vessel. Log that up in the 'Foreign Aid' column which gets overlooked by the 5 star feted Brooks Brothers clothed self-important UN bureaucratic trash. |
| Posted by: Cravish Angomons3644 2005-06-30 20:32 |
| #5 Offer to barter a load of khat for the return of the food. Before the khat is provided allow each surviving member of Task Force Ranger to drink a six pack and season the khat appropriately. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2005-06-30 20:03 |
| #4 Whatever happened to monetary awards, prize, and gain when cleansing the ocean of pirates? Time to return to that? Trace the boats back to the "soon to close in rubble" docks. Kill a couple Somali warlords just for Blackhawk Down and to remind them we have the DVDs to piss us off all over whenever we want |
| Posted by: Frank G 2005-06-30 19:00 |
| #3 "It is against international humanitarian law to hinder the passage of humanitarian assistance and there is no justification for hijacking," the WFP said. Somebody provide the WFP spokesperson with a DVD of The Wrath of Khan or maybe gift set of the works of Robert Lewis Stevenson. I don't think they have a working grasp of the piracy concept. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2005-06-30 17:43 |
| #2 Ooooh! Tough talk from the WFP, that ought to take care of those stinky pirates. |
| Posted by: bigjim-ky 2005-06-30 16:10 |
| #1 It is against international humanitarian law Iss this another new set? |
| Posted by: Shipman 2005-06-30 13:58 |