Karma Police

Yesterday, I posted about Somali pirates holding a crew hostgae for $20M (USD). Well, the other shoe has dropped. The hijacked ship was Iranian Russian. Update on that situation here. The US navy is claiming three pirates were killed in a shootout over whether or not to surrender. The pirates also began celebrating Ramadan. The vessel contains Russian made military equipment headed for Kenya. The USN is worried about it falling into al-Qaeda hands in Somalia.

(ed. 10/01/08 by Floyd): In a second act of piracy another group of Somali pirates hijacked an Iranian vessel in AugustFrom The Sunday Times:

Somali pirates suffered skin burns, lost hair and fell gravely ill “within days” of boarding the MV Iran Deyanat. Some of them died.

Andrew Mwangura, the director of the East African Seafarers’ Assistance Programme, told the Sunday Times: “We don’t know exactly how many, but the information that I am getting is that some of them had died. There is something very wrong about that ship.”

The vessel’s declared cargo consists of “minerals” and “industrial products”. But officials involved in negotiations over the ship are convinced that it was sailing for Eritrea to deliver small arms and chemical weapons to Somalia’s Islamist rebels.

Mwangura has been threatened with lawsuit by the Iranian company for calling the cargo “dangerous”. They also paid one installment of $200K on the ransom. It looks like the mullahs negotiate with criminals.

Thanks to Mr. Blank (Blankety-blank? ) sincerely — for pointing out that I had mixed up 2 pirate stories. You know our motto: Threedonia. Eventually we’ll get it half right.

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