Posted on 05/26/2009 10:58:07 AM PDT by WesternCulture
Swedish naval personnel arrested seven pirates in the Gulf of Aden in the early hours of Tuesday morning, according to a statement from the Swedish Armed Forces.
The pirates were apprehended by staff from the HMS Malmö as they attempted to board a Greek cargo vessel halfway between Yemen and Somalia.
HMS Malmö was ordered to respond to a distress signal sent out shortly before 1.30am by the M/V Antonis. The cargo ship's crew said they had come under rocket-proppeled grenade fire from two boats manned by pirates.
When the Swedish crew arrived at the scene the pirates were attempting to board the merchant vessel.
HMS Malmö fired warning shots at the pirates using cannons, machine guns and sniper fire in a bid to halt the attack, the Swedish military said.
When the pirates attempted to flee, the HMS Malmö took up the chase, focusing on one of the boats. After around twenty minutes, the pirates gave up and a Swedish crew was dispatched to board the pirates' fishing boat.
Seven men were handcuffed and taken on board the Swedish corvette. The boarding crew also seized two handguns, a GPS navigator and a grappling hook.
The pirates were to be taken to Djibouti on board the HMS Malmö, where further instructions would be issued by the European Union's NAVFOR-Atalanta mission command.
An agreement between the EU and Kenya stipulates that pirates arrested by EU forces are to be taken to Kenya to face trial.
Swedish naval forces began patrolling the Gulf of Aden on May 15th. The Navy's primary task is to watch over the transportation UN food aid to Somalia, though general marine supervision is also included in the force's mandate.
The Swedish naval force consists of the HMS Stockholm, HMS Malmö and the support vessel Trossö and is made up of 152 personnnel.
More information soon.
Thanks for posting.
Hardly something you would try and scare the Kreml with perhaps, but for hunting Somali pirates I guess it well could continue to be useful.
corvette ( ) n. A fast, lightly armed warship, smaller than a destroyer
Fine looking ship but small to be traveling from Sweden to the Somali coast.
“Fine looking ship but small to be traveling from Sweden to the Somali coast.”
- In that regard, a guy like Thor Heyerdahl wouldn’t have been especially impressed:)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kon-Tiki
Shades of Gustavus Augustus - well done Sweden. It does take effort and concern to get the lethargic Europe moving but given the vital trade through the Suez Canal, it becomes an obvious priority.
No, no. SINK not arrest.
Pretty amazing work, considering the crew had to assemble the ship from those little packages before they could respond.
Of course they WERE aided by their ability to read Swedish.
Lots of early WWII convoys were escorted by corvettes. Across the North Atlantic.
Start using subs...
DANG! Seek and you will find. Thank you brother. Looks hot to me. The car is nice too.
I have heard that Malmö is now a muslim city. I hope that I am wrong.
- Few people in Sweden would seriously call it a Muslim city, but if you use the expression “Muslim” in a generous fashion, you could perhaps say that in the “inner city” (the city itself, suburbs excluded, which has 250 000 inhabitants compared to the far less Muslim Metro area of housing 650 000 inhabitants) around 25% of the population have ties to Muslim countries. On the other hand, that includes, for instance, people who've fled Iran because they want nothing to do with Islam. I've met many Westernized Iranians. None from Somalia.
The most fanatic Muslims in the whole of Sweden live in the area of Rosengård, which is a ghetto-like area of inner city Malmö.
Thank you for the information.
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