Thursday, April 07, 2011
HELSINKI (Reuters) - The Finnish navy detained 18 suspected pirates on a boat in the Arabian Sea on Wednesday and is questioning them as part of international efforts to combat piracy in the region.
"This morning Pohjanmaa stopped suspected pirates in the Arabian Sea, some 500 miles southeast of Oman's Salalah," Commander Pasi Staff from the Finnish navy's operations division told Reuters.
The Finnish ship Pohjanmaa has been protecting shipping in waters off Somalia since February as part of a European Union Naval Force (EU NAVFOR) operation.
"A vessel was towing two smaller boats and when the Pohjanmaa approached it, the vessel tried to escape and warning shots were fired to stop it," Staff said, adding the commander of Pohjanmaa suspected the group had been involved in ship hijacking.
Somalia has lacked an effective central government for two decades, allowing piracy to boom in the strategic waterways off its shores linking Europe to Asia and Africa.
Source: Reuters