Pirates Take Ship, Crew Takes It Back

With U.S. Help, 22 Crewmembers Overpower Captors On North Korean Ship

(AP)  A U.S. Navy destroyer off the coast of Somalia helped sailors who retook control of their vessel Tuesday in a deadly battle with pirates who hijacked the North Korean-flagged ship, the American military said.

A helicopter flew from the USS James E. Williams to investigate a phoned-in tip of a hijacked vessel, and demanded by bridge-to-bridge radio that the pirates give their weapons, the military said in a statement. The sailors then overwhelmed the hijackers, leaving two pirates dead, according to preliminary reports, and five captured, the military said.

Three seriously injured crew members were brought onboard the Williams, it said.

Andrew Mwangura, program coordinator of the Seafarers Assistance Program, said an estimated 22 crew members were onboard of the North Korea-flagged vessel that gunmen seized late Monday from Somali waters near the capital, Mogadishu. His group independently monitors piracy in the region. Workers at the Mogadishu port said the vessel delivered a load of sugar from India.

The crew was piloting the ship back to the war-battered city's port in Mogadishu, he said.

Cmdr. Lydia Robertson, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Fifth Fleet, said could not independently confirm reports from the North Korean crew about the number of captured and killed pirates. She said the fleet routinely responds to distress calls from ships in the area, often for help fighting pirates.

"One of the missions of the coalition is to deter piracy, which is a big problem around Somalia," Robertson told The Associated Press by telephone from fleet headquarters in Manama, Bahrain. "When we get a distress call, we help."

An international watchdog reported this month that pirate attacks worldwide jumped 14 percent in the first nine months of 2007, with the biggest increases in the poorly policed waters of Somalia and Nigeria.

Reported attacks in Somali waters rose to 26, up from eight a year earlier, the London-based International Maritime Bureau said through its piracy reporting center in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

The U.S. Navy said ships in a coalition monitoring the waters near Somalia were also following a hijacked Japanese vessel in those waters, and that four other boats are still controlled by pirates near Somalia.

Somalia has had 16 years of violence and anarchy, and is now led by a government battling to establish authority even in the capital. Its coasts are virtually unpoliced.

Piracy off Somalia increased this year after Ethiopian forces backing Somali government troops ousted an Islamic militia in December, said Mwangura.

During the six months that the Council of Islamic Courts ruled most of southern Somalia, where Somali pirates are based, piracy abated, Mwangura said.

At one point, the Islamic group said it was sending scores of fighters to crack down on pirates there. Islamic fighters even stormed a hijacked, UAE-registered ship and recaptured it after a gunbattle in which pirates, but no crew members, were reportedly wounded.

The Somali capital has become especially unsafe in recent days, with fighting over the weekend between an Islamic militia and government forces backed by Ethiopian troops. The U.N. refugee agency said Tuesday around 36,000 people have been driven from their homes in what locals said was the worst fighting in months, adding to the tens of thousands who fled the capital earlier this year.

Somalia's president named Salim Aliyow Ibrow, a former deputy prime minister, as caretaker prime minister, a day after the outgoing premier lost a power struggle in the government and resigned.

By law, President Abdullahi Yusuf must name a permanent prime minister within 30 days of the resignation.

The new prime minister struck a conciliatory tone Tuesday, calling for an end to the country's crisis

"The time of fighting has ended, and we are in the season of reconciliation," he told The Associated Press.

But hundreds more families around the city's main market were preparing to flee the capital on Tuesday, loading trucks, buses and donkey carts with their belongings, said Jennifer Pagonis, spokeswoman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

"They're really rather confused about where to go: whether to stay, whether to leave the city entirely or whether to relocate to another part of the city," she told reporters in Geneva, Switzerland.

[ziparmux]

Some of the literature advocated violent jihad, murdering gay people and stoning adulterers, its researchers found.

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/f
oreignaffairs/story/0,,2201805,00.html

Posted by terrorislam4 at 06:14 AM : Nov 01, 2007

Thanks for the link, I was never happy that ''he'' is receiving a ''State'' visit here to be frank after reading that news article, the British establishment here, well they have no morals or ethics to allow a vvisit of such a foriegn dignitary here, Robert Mugabe would have ben afforded the same treatment one suspects if he had bought 12 Billion Dollars worth of the Eurofighter Typhoons, such as Saudi Arabia has done. BAE is as corrupt as the Carlyle Group

[terrorislam4]

VOTE FOR JEFFERSON VOTE AGAINST FASCIST NAZI TERRORISLAM VOTE GOP

dnc are like john adams and want to give the jihadist their lunch money hoping they will leave us alone

gop are like thomas jefferson and want to spend their lunch money on weapons and go kick the jihadists in their arses

What Thomas Jefferson learned from the Muslim book of jihad

Thomas Jefferson knew about fascist nazi islam, he killed plenty of them

In 1786 Jefferson and John Adams went to negotiate with Tripoli''s envoy to London, Ambassador Sidi Haji Abdrahaman or (Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja). They asked him by what right he extorted money and took slaves. Jefferson reported to Secretary of State John Jay, and to the Congress:

The ambassador answered us that [the right] was founded on the Laws of the Prophet (Mohammed), that it was written in their Koran, that all nations who should not have answered their authority were sinners, that it was their right and duty to make war upon them wherever they could be found, and to make slaves of all they could take as prisoners, and that every Mussulman who should be slain in battle was sure to go to heaven.
http://www.usvetdsp.com/jan07/jeff_quran.htm
America and the Barbary Pirates: An International Battle Against an Unconventional Foe
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/jefferson_papers/mtjprece.html
muslim justifies slavery and piracy%u2026
http://www.hawaiireporter.com/story.aspx?6bdec278-6a71-4436-bc4d-29d1c54b0ad7

[lewiston14]

I don''t see how genocide and pirating can be compared here but im listening. As I understand the word genocide means to remove something to its totality usually people or a race. Pirating is simple theft. If I was the owner of that ship and its contents I would be pretty pissed off and demanding something be done yet these countries keep insisting on that 10 mile coast limit which limits action time. Do they think we are going to attack them? These countries should consider then even in WW2 navy battle groups fought battles having never seen each other. 50 miles away would be easy and today 500 to 2000 miles is not a challenge. I never said the US had to be the force only that whoever does it needs to be within a mile of the coast for reaction time without wasting valuable time waiting for permission. Maybe in the near future the ship owners will think it%u2019s simple not worth the risk and avoid the area without a war ship escort.

[terrorislam4]

more terrorislam sponsored genocide

Thinktank accuses Saudi regime over hate literature

The controversial state visit of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, which got under way today with a lavish ceremony, has prompted new criticism over his regime''''s alleged role in distributing hate literature in British mosques.
The Policy Exchange thinktank found extremist literature in a quarter of the 100 mosques and Islamic institutions it visited, including London Central Mosque in Regent''''s Park, which is funded by Saudi Arabia.

Some of the literature advocated violent jihad, murdering gay people and stoning adulterers, its researchers found.
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/foreignaffairs/story/0,,2201805,00.html

[speakinup]

Hang them. Posted by speakinup

On public TV. Look at the picture above what do you see? What do you See? And don''''''''t blur the pictures

Posted by lewiston14 at 10:42 AM : Oct 31, 2007

Please do answer this persons question, I want to know your answer, I am intrigued as to what you may say. Posted by ziparmux

I see 3 or 4 individuals I''ve been told have committed a heinous crime. 3 or 4 individuals that were taken from the bridge of a ship, which had been pirated. 3 or 4 individuals that chose to go to a life of crime, possibly because of their plight of hunger, when the GROSS majority of those trapped in the same spot did not.

I see a liberal''s wet dream waiting to happen. "Oh, those poor individuals, they were just barely able to scrape together enough money to buy a boat that can go at least 21 knots so they could keep up with the takers they wanted to pirate."

"Those poor men - they could barely afford those AK47s and rocket propelled grenades they used to overtake the ship."

"It must have been terrible for them to sit out there in that oppressive heat, waiting for some evil capitalist to come along."

As soon as they are found guilty, take them to the most public place, and let them hang until their flesh falls off their bones.

[ziparmux]

Hang them. Posted by speakinup

On public TV. Look at the picture above what do you see? What do you See? And don''''t blur the pictures

Posted by lewiston14 at 10:42 AM : Oct 31, 2007

Please do answer this persons question, I want to know your answer, I am intrigued as to what you may say.

[lewiston14]

Hang them. Posted by speakinup

On public TV. Look at the picture above what do you see? What do you See? And don''t blur the pictures

[lewiston14]

ziparmux and earsmus6 I reread my post and it was ease to see my mistakes, sale instead of sail. I normally write in word, spell check then copy paste. Word might not have caught sale unless it was looking at a very bad use of grammar. I have no excuse that I did not proof read my post much better then I did so im sorry but im sure CBS could allow a person to edit his or her post to correct such mistakes. Am I going to fall into a pit of glass over this mistake NO

[ziparmux]

It is funny how they can use the word "s-e-x" in an article they have written but if we try to use it they censor it.

Ok, I am rambling now, BEDTIME.


Posted by erasmus6 at 03:51 AM : Oct 31, 2007

Yeah I noticed that about the word also, they use it in an article, then when we use it, *** !! No sense in that !

Sleep well :)

[erasmus6]

Now see, I made a mistake and I even read it over before I posted it. "mayby" should be "maybe". My excuse now is that I am tired, I think it is time for bed.

Also I used the word "d-a-r-n" in my post and CBS censored it! I could see that if I had used the word "d-a-m-n", but NOT "d-a-r-n".
It is funny how they can use the word "s-e-x" in an article they have written but if we try to use it they censor it.

Ok, I am rambling now, BEDTIME.