Somali pirates have seized a UAE oil tanker in the northern Indian Ocean, with 16 including three Bangladeshi crews on board, the European Union's naval force for Somalia said yesterday.
The other crew members are a Sri Lankan, five Indians, four Somalis, a Kenyan, a Sudanese and a Myanmarese, reports Reuters from Mogadishu.
Identities of the Bangladeshis could not be confirmed.
The hijackers captured the MV Jubba XX on Sunday morning when it was on a regular route from the United Arab Emirates to the Somali port of Berbera.
"Little information is available at present but it is reported that nine suspected Somali pirates are on board," the EU force said in a release.
Pirates have been increasingly targeting ships carrying commodities to the conflict-torn Northeast African nation, Ahmed Shire, a fuel trader in Mogadishu, told Reuters over the phone.
He expressed grave concern over the increasing incidents of piracy.
A Somali piracy gang on December 5 last year hijacked Bangladeshi ship M.V. Jahan Moni, 3,000 kilometres east of the Somalia coast. The vessel was sailing to Europe with merchandise from Singapore.
After weeks of hectic negotiations, the robbers freed the ship and its crew.
Somali pirates are making tens of millions of dollars in ransoms through seizing ships including tankers and bulk carriers in the Indian Ocean and the Gulf of Aden, despite efforts of foreign naval forces to prevent such attacks.
Source : The Daily Star
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