Pirates head for Somali lair as France plays waiting game
MOGADISHU (AFP) — Pirates who seized a French luxury cruise yacht and its 30-member crew in the Gulf of Aden were headed Saturday for their Indian Ocean lair off Puntland, northeast Somalia, local officials said.
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.
The pirates have "moved towards the coastal area of Eyl in Puntland, but I don't think that our administration can do anything to trace that boat because of insufficient access to the area", Bile Mohamoud Qabowsade, Puntland state adminstration officer, told AFP.
"We don't have a word yet from the hijackers and we don't know what they are about to ask, but I believe that those pirates could only be eliminated with the help of the international community," he added.
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 on Saturday.
"We have had no contact, neither with the crew of the boat nor with the pirates," Defence Minister Herve Morin said on France Inter radio when asked whether there had been a ransom demand, usual practice for pirates operating in the area.
"What normally happens is that the pirates head for territorial Somali waters and it's sometimes after they do that when specific demands are made, which often come in the form of ransoms," Morin added.
He refused to go into the details of the pirate emergency plan, although Prime Minister Francois Fillon pointed on Friday to a "relatively large military means in the area".
However, Fillon also said he would prioritise "the safeguarding of the lives of those on board, therefore all channels of discussion are open in an effort to try and resolve this business".
Morin said about a dozen pirates were involved and that around 20 of the 30-strong crew were French, the rest Ukrainians. There were no passengers on board at the time.
France has its largest foreign military base in nearby Djibouti, and sophisticated surveillance is available to it and a Djibouti-based United States-led multinational force, Combined Task Force 150.
Both are following the "evolution" of the crisis, French military spokesman Christophe Prazuck told AFP.
It bears all the hallmarks of a "hostage-taking," said Prazuck, adding that negotiations towards freeing the ship's crew would "employ the methods used to liberate hostages".
Amphibious assault and other special operations arms of the French navy are available under French anti-pirate emergency planning, as well as the French Gendarmerie's elite maritime hostage rescue unit.
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 French navy has been called on in recent months to escort World Food Programme boats through Somali waters, after two of the agency's boats were stolen.
Olivier Hallaoui, from French security specialists Secopex, warned that pirates in these waters represent "a powerful maritime mafia".
"Most are fishermen-turned-bandits, with links to clans, local militias who realise this is a lucrative business because in almost every case ransoms are paid," he said.
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.
