- Title: VARIOUS: Indian navy strikes at Somali pirates, destroys vessel
- Date: 19th November 2008
- Summary: BAND PLAYING ON DOCK GANG PLANK ON INS TABAR
- Embargoed: 4th December 2008 12:39
- Keywords:
- Topics: Crime / Law Enforcement,International Relations
- Reuters ID: LVA3Q0YEEIDWZBB5IMR6NRJXYNGQ
- Aspect Ratio: 4:3
- Story Text: Indian navy sinks pirate vessel as explosion of Somali piracy continues.
An Indian warship deployed in the Gulf of Aden fought Somali pirates and destroyed their vessel after a brief battle, the navy said on Tuesday (November 18).
The announcement came as gunmen from Somalia seized two more vessels despite a large international naval presence off their lawless country.
The buccaneers have taken a Thai fishing boat, a Greek bulk carrier and a Hong Kong-flagged ship heading to Iran since Saturday's spectacular capture of a Saudi supertanker carrying $100 million of oil, the biggest ship hijacked in history.
The explosion of piracy off Somalia this year has driven up insurance costs, made some shipping companies divert around South Africa and prompted an unprecedented military response from NATO, the European Union and others.
India's navy said one of its warships, INS Tabar, clashed with pirates on Tuesday.
"When we again questioned them, the ship opened fire. At this point of time, INS Tabar that was there opened fire, retaliatory fire in self-defence. We found that very soon the ship was going...there were explosives which were heard supposedly from the ammunition that may have been stacked on board the mother ship. Simultaneously, two boats supposedly the fast attack boats, which generally these pirates use in their hijacking operations veered off from the ship. INS Tabar gave a chase to these boats.
After some time we found one of those boats was abandoned and the other boat seems to have made its escape in the darkness of the night," said naval officer Captain P.K. Bannerjee.
INS Tabar, which is the third of the Talwar-class frigates of the Indian Navy, has been conducting anti-piracy patrols in the Gulf of Aden since October 23 as a sizeable portion of the country's trade flows through the area and there has been a quantum increase in the number of piracy attacks in this region over the last few months.
On November 11 also, the Indian Navy warship foiled an attempt by the pirates to hijack an Indian and a Saudi ship off the Somalian coast.
The pirates on powerboats attacked the Saudi Arabia-registered merchant vessel MV Timaha, and half an hour later a second group tried to board the Indian merchant vessel MV Jag Arnav, owned by the Great Eastern Shipping Co Ltd.
The sharp increase in attacks at sea this year off the poor and chaotic country has been fuelled by a growing Islamist insurgency onshore -- gun battles broke out again in Mogadishu on Wednesday -- and the lure of multi-million-dollar ransoms.
Somalia's Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein told Reuters naval patrols would not stop piracy and appealed for more help to tackle criminal networks with links beyond his country.
No ransom has been demanded so far for the Saudi supertanker Sirius Star, which the pirates seized after dodging international naval patrols in their boldest strike yet.
A spokesman for the owners, Saudi Aramco, said the company hoped to hear from the hijackers later on Wednesday. One Somali website said the attackers were demanding $250 million.
The Sirius Star was seized 450 nautical miles southeast of Mombasa, far beyond the gangs' usual area of operations. It was believed to be anchored near Eyl, a former Somali fishing village that is now a well-defended pirate base.
Somali gunmen are believed to be holding about a dozen ships in the Eyl area and more than 200 hostages. Among those vessels is a Ukrainian ship loaded with 33 tanks and other weapons that was captured in another high-profile strike earlier this year.
Chinese state media said on Wednesday a Hong Kong cargo ship taken in September had been freed and all 25 crew were safe.
The Sirius Star was seized despite an international naval effort, including by NATO, to guard one of the world's busiest shipping routes.
Warships from the United States, France, Russia and India are stationed off Somalia.
But experts say deep pessimism over the prospects of any peace process onshore, bitter memories of disastrous past interventions, and the need to put out fires elsewhere -- from Afghanistan to Congo -- have snuffed out any real will to act.
Given that the pirates are well armed with grenades, heavy machine guns and rocket-launchers, most foreign navies have steered clear of direct confrontation once ships have been hijacked, for fear of putting hostages at risk. In most cases, the owners of hijacked ships are trying to negotiate ransoms. - Copyright Holder: ANI (India)
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