All 21 crew members on board the “MV Lila Norfolk”, including 15 from India, were released, as the Navy announced on Friday on Platform X, formerly Twitter.
Indian task forces also confirmed that there were no longer any hijackers on board. “The hijack attempt by pirates was probably aborted due to strong warning from an Indian naval patrol aircraft and surveillance of an Indian warship,” it said.
The British Maritime Observatory (UKTMO) said on Thursday that five to six armed people boarded the Liberian-flagged ship regarding 460 nautical miles east of the Somali town of Eyl. According to the captain, the crew barricaded themselves in the ship’s citadel following the attack, it said.
The Indian Navy immediately sent the warship “INS Chennai” to the freighter to intervene if possible and ensure the safety of the crew. The Indian Navy only increased its presence in the region in December following a suspected drone attack and sent warships to the Arabian Sea.
The coast off the crisis state of Somalia was once the scene of repeated pirate attacks. However, as part of the EU mission “Atalanta”, which has been running since 2008 to combat piracy there, the attacks have decreased significantly. According to the IMB Piracy Reporting Center, the most recent hijacking occurred on December 14th, when a freighter was hijacked and driven to Somalia.
Somalia is located in the Horn of Africa on the other side of the Gulf of Aden from Yemen. The dangers in the region have increased sharply. Since the outbreak of the Gaza war, the Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen have repeatedly attacked ships in the Red Sea to prevent them from passing through to Israel. The Red Sea is considered one of the most important shipping routes for world trade because it connects the Mediterranean with the Indian Ocean via the Suez Canal in Egypt.
