Somalia: Italian anchored the tug by pirates near the coast

The Italian tug Buccaneer and its 16 crew members held by Somali pirates since Saturday, dropped anchor off the village of Lasqorey in self-autonomous region of Puntland (north-east of Somalia), it was learned from official sources Monday.

"We spotted the Italian tug, he dropped anchor in the coastal zone of Lasqorey," said the AFP Tar Abdiweli Ali, head of a Somali coastguard tasked by the Government of Puntland fighting against piracy.

The 16 crew members - ten Italians, five Romanians and a Croatian - Monday were still on board the tug, "said Tar, reached by AFP by telephone from Mogadishu.

"We plan to send a team on site to ascertain the demands of hijackers," he said. He added that "the Coast Guard (were) ready to fight if necessary to prosecute pirates.

This society, SomCan, has repeatedly clashed with pirates off the Somali coast.

Sunday, one responsible for the pirates told AFP that the Buccaneer was bound for Lasqorey with at least ten pirates on board and an escort of several speed boats.

Lasqorey is located on the shores of the Gulf of Aden to about 110 km west of the port of Bosasso, the economic capital of Puntland.

The Buccaneer was captured Saturday by pirates in the Gulf of Aden, according to an official of the owner, the company Micoperi Marine Contractors.

This attack is part of a dramatic increase in activity of Somali pirates who have seized several foreign vessels from a week in the nose and beard of global deployed naval powers in the area.

In 2008, hackers had attacked more than 130 merchant ships off Somalia, three times more than in 2007, according to the International Maritime Bureau.