Somali Pirates Hijack Supertanker

[jlomon]

If this doesn't spur on some action on the pirate problem, I don't know what will.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20081117.wsauditanker117/BNStory/International/home


Pirates seize Saudi oil supertanker


RAISSA KASLOWSKY AND SIMON WEBB

Reuters

November 17, 2008 at 10:56 AM EST

DUBAU — Pirates have seized a Saudi-owned supertanker fully laden with oil off east Africa, capturing the biggest vessel yet in a shipping zone where Somali pirates strike almost daily, the U.S. navy said.

Saudi-owned television station Al Arabyia said the Sirius Star had been freed, citing an unnamed official Saudi source, but the U.S. navy and Saudi Aramco, which owns the supertanker, both said they had no knowledge of any release.

The hijacking of the vessel is certain to add to pressure for concerted international action to tackle the threat posed by pirates from anarchic Somalia to one of the world's busiest shipping routes.

“This is unprecedented. It's the largest ship that we've seen pirated,” said Lieutenant Nathan Christensen, a spokesman for the U.S. Fifth Fleet. “It's three times the size of an aircraft carrier.”


The Sirius Star held a cargo of as much as two million barrels of oil — more than one quarter of daily Saudi Arabia's daily exports. Reports of the hijacking helped trim early losses in global crude oil prices.

The hijacking, 830 kilometres southeast of Mombasa, Kenya, was in an area far beyond the Gulf of Aden, where most of the attacks on shipping have taken place and where some foreign navies have begun patrols.

The pirates have been getting bolder.

The Sirius Star had been heading for the United States via the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa, skirting the continent instead of heading through the Gulf of Aden and then the Suez Canal.

There were no reports of damage to the ship, Christensen said. He declined to say if the U.S. navy was considering taking action to rescue the tanker, which had 25 crew from Croatia, Britain, the Philippines, Poland and Saudi Arabia.

“We are evaluating the situation,” he said.

Chaos onshore in Somalia, where Islamist forces are fighting a Western-backed government, have spawned a wave of piracy. Shipowners have paid out millions of dollars in ransoms.

Well over 60 vessels have been hijacked this year, driving up shipping insurance premiums and pushing some vessels to take longer routes between Asia and Europe than passing through the Suez Canal -- potentially increasing the cost of traded goods.

Among the vessels seized is one with 33 tanks on board.

British think tank Chatham House warned in a report last month of the danger a tanker could come under attack.

“As pirates become bolder and use ever more powerful weaponry a tanker could be set on fire, sunk or forced ashore, any of which could result in an environmental catastrophe that would devastate marine and bird life for years to come,” it said.

“The pirates' aim is to extort ransom payments and to date that has been their main focus; however, the possibility that they could destroy shipping is very real.”

The NATO alliance and the European Union have scrambled to provide patrols in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean waterways off Somalia. The United States and France, which have bases nearby, are also helping, while Russia has sent a warship too.

The Sirius Star is Liberian-flagged, and owned and operated by state oil giant Saudi Aramco's shipping unit Vela International. The vessel was launched in March.