Somali gunmen hijack ship carrying food aid

NAIROBI – Somali gunmen have hijacked a ship carrying 850 tonnes of World Food Programme (WFP) rice for Somali tsunami survivors and are demanding US$500 000 to free the 10 crew on board, the ship’s owner said yesterday.

The MV Semlow was captured between Haradhere and Hobyo, some 300 km north-east of the Somali capital Mogadishu on Monday, while en route to the port of Bossaso. “The hijackers are asking for US$500 000 but we’ve told them we’re just a small boat with relief cargo to feed your Somali people,” said Inayet Kudrati, director of the Kenya-based Mokatu Shipping Agency which leased the ship to the WFP.He said the hijackers had told him the crew – a Sri Lankan captain, a Tanzanian engineer and eight Kenyans – were safe.The International Maritime Bureau has classed the waters around the lawless Horn of Africa country as some of the world’s most dangerous.Warlords overran Somalia and carved it into fiefdoms after ousting dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.The WFP said the food aid, donated by Japan and Germany, was destined for thousands of Somalis affected by the December 26 tsunami, and appealed to the local community to help negotiate the release of the boat and its cargo.”We’re urging local leaders and elders to allow the boat to go on with its journey,” WFP spokeswoman Rene McGuffin said.The WFP is providing food to 28 000 Somalis whose homes and lives were devastated by the killer wave that swept across the Indian Ocean after an undersea earthquake off north Indonesia.- Nampa-Reuters”The hijackers are asking for US$500 000 but we’ve told them we’re just a small boat with relief cargo to feed your Somali people,” said Inayet Kudrati, director of the Kenya-based Mokatu Shipping Agency which leased the ship to the WFP.He said the hijackers had told him the crew – a Sri Lankan captain, a Tanzanian engineer and eight Kenyans – were safe.The International Maritime Bureau has classed the waters around the lawless Horn of Africa country as some of the world’s most dangerous.Warlords overran Somalia and carved it into fiefdoms after ousting dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.The WFP said the food aid, donated by Japan and Germany, was destined for thousands of Somalis affected by the December 26 tsunami, and appealed to the local community to help negotiate the release of the boat and its cargo.”We’re urging local leaders and elders to allow the boat to go on with its journey,” WFP spokeswoman Rene McGuffin said.The WFP is providing food to 28 000 Somalis whose homes and lives were devastated by the killer wave that swept across the Indian Ocean after an undersea earthquake off north Indonesia.- Nampa-Reuters