Breaking: Malta-flagged ship hijacked by Somali pirates released

The Turkish-owned cargo ship “MV Frigia” had been hijacked by Somali pirates on 23 March 2010 with 21 crew members on board.

The “MV Frigia” had been hijacked in waters between Somalia and India, in an area some 400 nautical miles outside a shipping corridor protected by an international naval fleet.

EU NAVFOR, the EU mission which was patrolling the Somali coast to protect against piracy, had confirmed the hijack in a statement issued early in the afternoon.

“On Tuesday morning, the Malta flagged Turkish owned (Garanti Finansal Kiralama) cargo ship MV Frigia, deadweight 35,000 tonnes, was reported hijacked in the Indian Ocean,” the EU NAVFOR statement had added.

The hijacking had taken place approximately 1000 Nautical miles east of the northern coast of Somalia. EU NAVFOR had added that this position was “closer to India than Somalia” and had been approximately 400 Nautical Miles outside the normal EU NAVFOR operation area.

The ship had been heading from Port Said to Kaousichang in Thailand with a crew of 19 Turkish sailors and 2 Ukrainian sailors.

The ship had been heading East but had then turned around, had been heading West and “appears to be heading for one of the known pirate ports off the coast of Somalia,” EU NAVFOR had added.

Somali pirates were a persistent problem in the Indian Ocean area. Several NATO and EU-member countries had contributed to the naval patrols that had been set up to deter the pirates.

Only a few weeks before the hijacking, Malta had announced that it had been going to join the EU’s anti-piracy mission in Somalia by sending a team of Armed Forces’ of Malta (AFM) soldiers on board a Dutch ship.

Turkish sources reported that the ship had signalled an emergency alarm at 03.37 am which was when the attack took place.

The same sources were quoted as saying that the ship that had been carrying fertilisers from Israel to Thailand and had gone through risky waters where the Somali pirates had a strong-hold with a Chinese escort on Saturday 20 March,

After the risky waters had passed, MV Frigia had continued its journey towards the port in Thailand on its own, when the attack took place.

It was expected that the ship would be turned around to the Somalian EYL shipping port.

EU NAVFOR had said it would “continue to monitor the situation”.

Operation Atalanta’s main tasks were to escort merchant vessels carrying humanitarian aid of the World Food Program (WFP) and vessels of AMISOM, and to protect vulnerable ships in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean and to deter and disrupt piracy. EU NAVFOR also monitored fishing activity off the coast of Somalia.