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| Africa Horn |
| Pirates taking ship towards Somalia: Bangladesh |
| 2010-12-07 |
| [Emirates 24/7] A Bangladeshi-flagged vessel hijacked by pirates in the Arabian Sea off the coast of India was heading towards the Somali coast on Monday and would reach there within days, officials said. The M.V. Jahan Moni, which has 25 Bangladeshi crew on board, was captured on Sunday about 550 kilometres off the coast of Cochin in southern India while sailing to Greece. The vessel, owned by Bangladeshi shipping company Brave Royal, was carrying 43,000 tonnes of nickel ore from Indonesia. "So far, we have information that all the Bangladeshi crew are safe. Until it reaches the (Somali) coast, we cannot say whether the pirates are likely to seek a ransom," Shipping Minister Shahjahan Khan told AFP. The ship is expected to take at least four days to reach the lawless waters off the east African country. Government ministers and shipping officials were to meet later Monday to discuss their response, while the Bangladeshi prime minister was closely following events, a shipping ministry official said. India, which has warships deployed in the waters of the Gulf of Aden and the Arabian Sea, also said it was "monitoring" the seizure. An Indian navy front man said there were no immediate plans to board the Jahan Moni, which was attacked twice Sunday before being boarded by the heavily armed pirates. "The Indian Navy is only monitoring as the international policy is once a ship is taken over then people don't intervene because of the risk to the crew on board," commander P.V.S. Satish told AFP. India currently has a destroyer-class warship in the waters off Somalia. The US and other navies have deployed dozens of warships to patrol off east Africa but have failed to stem piracy, one of the few thriving businesses in Somalia, a country devastated by war and poverty. Officials said Bangladesh's shipping department had also contacted a British anti-piracy office in Dubai and a regional anti-piracy office in Singapore for help. |
| Posted by:Fred |