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Hijacked French yacht sails
further south off Somali
Mogadishu—A hijacked French luxury cruise yacht and its 30-member
crew on Sunday sailed further south, headed for the pirates’ Indian
Ocean lair off Puntland, northeast Somalia, a local official said.
“We are getting information that the pirates are now moving towards
southern coastal area of Garaad where I believe they will stay,”
said Abdullahi Said Aw-Yusuf, local government official in the area.
“They are well-armed pirates from Puntland region, so they cannot go
far beyond Garaad,” he added, explaining that the hijackers cannot
go south beyond their lair.
But France had still to receive any ransom or other demand from the
hijackers—with authorities playing a waiting game despite activating
emergency anti-pirate planning which can involve the mobilisation of
elite special forces.
Despite sophisticated surveillance capacities and a helicopter
flying over the 32-cabin, four-deck yacht ‘The Ponant’ on Friday
after it was boarded between Somalia and Yemen, communications
remained frozen Saturday. Pirate attacks are frequent off Somalia’s
3,700-kilometre (2,300-mile) coastline, prompting the International
Maritime Bureau to advise sailors not to venture closer than 200
nautical miles to its shore.
Somalia, which lies at the mouth of the Red Sea on a major trade
route between Asia and Europe via the Suez Canal, has not had a
functional government since the 1991 ousting of dictator Mohamed
Siad Barre.
The three-masted 850-tonne Ponant, equipped with lounges, bar and
restaurant, had been due to host a cruise between Alexandria in
Egypt and Valletta in Malta on April 21-22, its Marseille-based
owner said.—AFP
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