MOGADISHU (Xinhua) -- African Union (AU) peacekeeping troops based in the Somali capital Mogadishu foiled a hijacking attempt by Somali pirates of a Panama-flagged ship off Mogadishu coast, AU peacekeepers’ spokesman said Friday.

 

The ship was attacked late Thursday evening by a group of armed men while on its way to the Mogadishu seaport to offload a cargo of commercial goods for Somali businesses people.

 

“We received an SOS call yesterday (Thursday) in the evening, late in the evening, from the crew of the ship and, I think, one of the owners of the consignment on the ship, that there was an attempted hijacking of the ship,” Bridgye Bohouko, spokesman for AU peacekeeping Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) told Xinhua.

 

The spokesman said AMISOM sent troops to free the ship and after a brief shootout with the gunmen who managed to escape, the ship was freed and escorted to the port.

 

The gunmen who boarded the ship managed to access the cabin crew but Bohouko neither denied nor confirmed reports of the killing of the captain of the ship.

 

It was the first incidence of piracy attacks so close to Mogadishu coast in recent times.

 

Somalia's coast has been the scene of growing piracy activity that led the UN Security Council to authorize states to send their naval force to fight the menace.

 

Dozens of warships from different countries now patrol the Somali coast and the gulf of Aden drastically reducing piracy activities in the region, one of the most important waterways in the world.

 

Source: Xinhua, Sept 25, 2009