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Piracy feared as mystery of missing ship deepens
Published in Saudi Press Agency on 13 - 08 - 2009


Pirates probably hijacked a
merchant ship which disappeared after sailing through the
English Channel last month, its operator said on Wednesday, according to Reuters.
The Kremlin has ordered Russian warships to join the hunt
for the 4,000-tonne, 98-metre bulk carrier Arctic Sea, whose
mysterious fate has baffled national maritime authorities across
Europe and North Africa.
The Maltese-registered vessel, carrying a cargo of timber
worth $1.3 million, was supposed to have docked on Aug. 4 in the
Algerian port of Bejaia.
It never arrived, raising fears of a rare case of piracy in
northern European seas.
"My view is that it is most likely that the vessel has been
hijacked," Viktor Matveyev, director of the Finnish company
Solchart, which operates the vessel, told Reuters. "It is
unclear where the vessel is now.
A wave of piracy has hit shipping off Somalia, and an
international naval force patrols its coast in an effort to
protect merchant vessels. But a hijacking in European waters
would be almost unprecedented in modern times.
"If this is piracy, and it seems most likely of all that it
is, then it is one of the first cases in recent history of
piracy in these seas," said Matveyev.
Concerns over the safety of the 15-member Russian crew were
raised after the Malta Maritime Authority said it received
reports the ship had been boarded by armed men in masks posing
as anti-drugs police in Swedish waters on July 24.
Swedish authorities said none of its law enforcement
agencies had been involved.
Crew members were assaulted, tied, gagged and blindfolded
and some were seriously hurt, Malta said.
"We have no details about the crew though we of course hope
that everything is okay with them," said Matveyev. "We very much
hope the crew is well and healthy."
Last radio contact with the Arctic Sea was on July 28 from
the Dover Strait between Britain and France. Shortly afterwards
an electronic signal showing its location was turned off.
Russia's domestic intelligence service, the FSB, was helping
to investigate the mystery and its agents were at the offices of
Solchart Arkhangelsk, which is listed as the ship's owner,
Russian media reported.
Mikhail Boytenko, editor of Russia's respected Sovfracht
maritime journal, said that the ship may have been carrying a
secret cargo unknown to the vessel's owners or operators.
"I think there was probably some sort of secret cargo on
this vessel, not criminal but secret," he told Reuters.
"I don't think that it was pirates who took this vessel but
it really smells of some sort of state involvement. This is real
cloak and dagger stuff, like a (John) le Carre novel."
Relatives of the crew appealed to Prime Minister Vladimir
Putin in an open letter and demanded a criminal investigation
into the vessel's disappearance, Russian media reported, but
have now stopped speaking publicly about the case.
Russian maritime journal Sovfracht reported on Thursday that
a ship similar to the Arctic Sea had docked in the Spanish port
of San Sebastian but the city, a popular seaside resort, only
has a marina for small pleasure craft.
The port authority for the closest commercial port, Pasajes,
said no such ship has docked.


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