India blows up pirate boat

By Abdi Sheikh

MOGADISHU (Reuters) - An Indian warship blew up a pirate ship in the Gulf of Aden and gunmen from Somalia seized two more vessels, defying the foreign warships patrolling the seas off their anarchic country.

Buccaneers have taken a Thai fishing boat, a Greek bulk carrier and a Hong Kong-flagged ship heading for Iran since Saturday's spectacular capture of a Saudi supertanker carrying $100 million of oil, the biggest ship hijacking in history.

The White House said U.S. President George W. Bush had been briefed and the United States was consulting other U.N. Security Council members on ways to combat the wave of piracy.

The supertanker Sirius Star was seized despite an existing effort to guard one of the world's busiest shipping arteries by naval ships from the United States, France, Russia and India.

Saudi Arabia said the ship's owners were in talks over a possible ransom. Iran said it was seeking contact with the Hong Kong ship, which it had chartered to import grain.

The explosion of piracy off Somalia this year has driven up insurance costs, made some shipping companies divert around South Africa and prompted an unprecedented military response from NATO, the European Union and others.

"The pirates are sending out a message to the world that 'we can do what we want, we can think the unthinkable, do the unexpected'," Andrew Mwangura, coordinator of the East African Seafarers' Assistance Program, told Reuters in Mombasa.

India's navy said one of its warships destroyed a pirate ship in the Gulf of Aden in a brief battle late on Tuesday.

"Fire broke out on the vessel and explosions were heard, possibly due to exploding ammunition that was stored on the vessel," the navy said, adding that two speedboats sped away.

The International Maritime Bureau said pirates from Somalia had hijacked a Thai fishing boat with 16 crew. That followed the capture of the Hong Kong-flagged ship carrying grain to Iran.

Mwangura's group said a Greek bulk carrier had also been seized, but an official at Greece's Merchant Marine Ministry said in Athens no such incident had been recorded.

The sharp increase in attacks this year off Somalia has been fueled by a growing Islamist insurgency onshore and the lure of multi-million-dollar ransoms.

Somali Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein told Reuters naval patrols would not stop piracy and appealed for more help to tackle criminal networks with links beyond his country.

Russian ambassador to NATO Dmitry Rogozin said NATO, the European Union and others should launch land operations against bases of Somali pirates in coordination with Russia.

Analysts say paying ransoms exacerbates piracy, but like most victims the owners of the Sirius Star have begun talks.