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PIRATES GET 'CRUDE'
SEIZE TANKER - & $100M CARGO
By RAISSA KASOLOWSKY and SIMON WEBB, Reuters
Somali piraes capture a fully loaded Saudi supertanker far off east Africa.
Somali pirates have captured a fully loaded Saudi supertanker far off east Africa, seizing the biggest vessel ever hijacked and its cargo of oil worth more than $100 million - in an attack that pushed world crude prices higher.
The US Fifth Fleet said the Sirius Star was seized Sunday 450 miles off Mombasa, Kenya, and was taken to the pirate haven of Eyl in northern Somalia.
A maritime group today reported spotting the huge vessel off Eyl.
"The world has never seen anything like this," said Andrew Mwangura of the East African Seafarers' Association.
The hijacking of the Saudi Aramco-owned vessel is certain to add to pressure for international action to tackle the growing threat posed by pirates from anarchic Somalia to one of the world's busiest shipping routes.
"This is unprecedented. It's the largest ship that we've seen pirated," said Lt. Nathan Christensen, a spokesman for the Fifth Fleet. "It's three times the size of an aircraft carrier."
The Sirius Star held as much as 2 million barrels of oil - more than one quarter of Saudi Arabia's daily exports. The hijacking helped lift global oil prices more than $1, to over $58 a barrel; they later dropped.
Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, suggested military action would be complicated by hostages and ransom demands.
"I'm stunned by the range of it," Mullen told reporters at the Pentagon that distance from the African coast was the longest he had seen to date.
"Once they get to a point where they can board, it becomes very difficult to get them off because, clearly, now they hold hostages."
The Sirius Star had been heading for the United States via the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa.
The ship, at 318,000 deadweight tons, was the largest ever captured by pirates. Chaos onshore in Somalia, where Islamist forces are fighting a Western-backed government, has spawned a wave of piracy, with ship owners paying out millions in ransoms.
http://www.nypost.com/seven/11182008/ne ... 139257.htm
SEIZE TANKER - & $100M CARGO
By RAISSA KASOLOWSKY and SIMON WEBB, Reuters
Somali piraes capture a fully loaded Saudi supertanker far off east Africa.
Somali pirates have captured a fully loaded Saudi supertanker far off east Africa, seizing the biggest vessel ever hijacked and its cargo of oil worth more than $100 million - in an attack that pushed world crude prices higher.
The US Fifth Fleet said the Sirius Star was seized Sunday 450 miles off Mombasa, Kenya, and was taken to the pirate haven of Eyl in northern Somalia.
A maritime group today reported spotting the huge vessel off Eyl.
"The world has never seen anything like this," said Andrew Mwangura of the East African Seafarers' Association.
The hijacking of the Saudi Aramco-owned vessel is certain to add to pressure for international action to tackle the growing threat posed by pirates from anarchic Somalia to one of the world's busiest shipping routes.
"This is unprecedented. It's the largest ship that we've seen pirated," said Lt. Nathan Christensen, a spokesman for the Fifth Fleet. "It's three times the size of an aircraft carrier."
The Sirius Star held as much as 2 million barrels of oil - more than one quarter of Saudi Arabia's daily exports. The hijacking helped lift global oil prices more than $1, to over $58 a barrel; they later dropped.
Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, suggested military action would be complicated by hostages and ransom demands.
"I'm stunned by the range of it," Mullen told reporters at the Pentagon that distance from the African coast was the longest he had seen to date.
"Once they get to a point where they can board, it becomes very difficult to get them off because, clearly, now they hold hostages."
The Sirius Star had been heading for the United States via the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa.
The ship, at 318,000 deadweight tons, was the largest ever captured by pirates. Chaos onshore in Somalia, where Islamist forces are fighting a Western-backed government, has spawned a wave of piracy, with ship owners paying out millions in ransoms.
http://www.nypost.com/seven/11182008/ne ... 139257.htm
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