Indian warship sinks Gulf pirate boat

An Indian warship sank a pirate boat after it refused to stop and be searched in the latest encoutner in the Gulf of Aden where piracy has been described as 'out of control'.

An Indian warship sank a pirate boat after it refused to stop and be searched in the latest encounter in the Gulf of Aden where piracy has been described as 'out of control'.

The Indian navy said the pirates fired on the INS Tabar - it fired back, destroying the ship, and then chased another speedboat, which was later found abandoned.

Meanwhile in the area separate bands of pirates hijacked two ships and captured their crews, clear signs that the gangs roaming the Gulf are becoming bolder and more violent.

A Thai ship with 16 crew members and an Iranian cargo vessel with a crew of 25 were hijacked yesterday said Noel Choong of the International Maritime Bureau’s piracy reporting centre in Malaysia.

“It’s getting out of control,” Mr Choong said.

The incidents raised to eight the number of ships hijacked this week alone. Since the beginning of the year 39 ships have been hijacked in the Gulf of Aden, out of 95 attacked.

“There is no firm deterrent, that’s why the pirate attacks are continuing,” Mr Choong said. “The criminal activities are flourishing because the risks are low and the rewards are extremely high.”

The pirates once mainly roamed the waters off the Somali coast, but now they have spread in every direction and are targeting ships further at sea, according to Mr Choong.

He said 17 vessels remain in the hands of pirates along with more than 300 crew members, including a Ukrainian ship loaded with weapons and a Saudi Arabian supertanker carrying 100 million in crude dollars of oil.

Despite increased patrols by Nato and other forces, the attacks have continued unabated off Somalia, which is caught up in an Islamic insurgency and has had no functioning government since 1991. Pirates have generally released ships they have seized after ransoms are paid.

Nato has three warships in the Gulf of Aden and the US Navy’s Bahrain-based 5th Fleet also has ships in the region.

But Commander Jane Campbell of the 5th Fleet said naval patrols simply cannot prevent attacks given the vastness of the sea and the 21,000 vessels passing through the Gulf of Aden every year.

“Given the size of the area and given the fact that we do not have naval assets – either ships or airplanes – to be everywhere with every single ship” it would be virtually impossible to prevent every attack, she said.

The Gulf of Aden connects to the Red Sea, which in turn is linked to the Mediterranean by the Suez Canal. The route is thousands of miles and many days shorter than going around the Cape of Good Hope off the southern tip of Africa.

The Thai boat, which was flying a flag from the tiny Pacific nation of Kiribati but operated out of Thailand, made a distress call as it was being chased by pirates in two speedboats but the phone connection was cut off midway.

The Iranian carrier was flying a Hong Kong flag but operated by the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines.

Yesterday major Norwegian shipping group Odfjell ordered its more than 90 tankers to sail around Africa rather than use the Suez Canal after the seizure of the Saudi tanker on Saturday.

Saudi Arabia, the world’s leading oil producer, has condemned the hijacking and said it will join the international fight against piracy. Despite the fact that its government barely works, Somali officials vowed to try to rescue the ship by force if necessary.