Somali pirates yesterday threatened to kill any South Korean seamen they take hostage in future in revenge for the killing of eight pirates by South Korean troops who stormed a hijacked vessel.
Pirates from two bases on the Somali coast said they were taking some crews held as hostages off their vessels and moving them inland in case of more rescue attempts by the fleet of foreign warships patrolling off the lawless country’s shores.
Somali pirates typically do not harm their captives because they expect to negotiate a lucrative ransom for the release of a vessel, but now they say they want to avenge the deaths of their comrades.
PHOTO: REUTERS
“We never planned to kill, but now we shall seek revenge,” a pirate who identified himself as Mohamed said by telephone.
“We shall never take a ransom from [South] Korean ships, we shall burn them and kill their crew. We shall redouble our efforts. [South] Korea has put itself in trouble by killing my colleagues,” he said from the pirate haven of Garad.
South Korea’s navy rescued all 21 crew aboard the chemical carrier Samho Jewelry on Friday. The vessel belonged to Samho Shipping, whose oil supertanker Samho Dream was released last November after being held by Somali pirates for seven months.
The pirates said they had received a record ransom of US$9.5 million for the release of the supertanker.
“We have started taking the crew of [hijacked] ships inland and we have tightened our security. We lost great men in the fight with South Korean commandos,” a pirate called Hussein said.
It was not possible to verify the movement of hostages. A -Kenya-based maritime official said -pirates often transferred crews when panicked, but expressed doubts over the threat to kill Korean crews.
“They are jumpy right now and they could do anything, but their main objective is always money,” said Andrew Mwangura, head of the East African Seafarers Assistance Programme.
Meanwhile, despite successful raids by the Malaysian and South Korean navies that rescued two ships and their crew members from Somali pirates, the EU Naval Force said it would not follow suit because such raids could further endanger hostages.
Malaysia’s navy was holding seven Somali pirates on Saturday who were apprehended in the second dramatic commando raid within hours on ships seized near the African coast, authorities said.
The Royal Malaysian Navy said its commandos wounded three pirates in a gunbattle and rescued the 23 crew members on the -Malaysian-flagged chemical tanker MT Bunga Laurel early on Friday, shortly after the pirates stormed the vessel in the Gulf of Aden with assault rifles and pistols.
EU Naval Force spokesman Wing Commander Paddy O’Kennedy said despite these successes, the force would not change its approach toward tackling piracy.
“Our priority is the safety of the hostages. The pirates are using the hostages as human shields and if we get too close to the pirates they threaten to kill the hostages ... I am sure they will carry out the threats if we got too close,” O’Kennedy said.
The force last year disrupted 64 attempted hijackings by Somali pirate groups, he said.
The EU naval force has also used a strategy of destroying pirates’ ships, which normally include several skiffs and a mother vessel.
There are now 29 vessels and 703 hostages being held by pirates off the coast of Somalia.
South Korea is studying whether to bring the five captured pirates to Seoul for prosecution or hand them over to countries near Somalia, Yonhap news agency said, citing an unidentified government official.
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