Pirates free another ship after 3 months
A Greek-owned vessel held by Somali pirates for three months has been freed after an aircraft dropped an undisclosed amount of ransom onto the ship’s deck, it emerged yesterday. All 25 crew members, including three Greeks, were reportedly in good health. The Marshall Islands-registered Filitsa was seized in November off the Gulf of Aden when it was taken to the Somali coast. A spokesman for Atalanta, the European Union’s anti-piracy force, was quoted as saying that the Filitsa was freed late Monday, a few hours after the ransom payment. Last month, a Greek-flagged oil tanker and its 28-strong crew were released by Somali pirates after payment of a 3.8-million-euro ransom that had also been dropped by air. The Maran Centaurus, carrying 2 million barrels of crude oil to the US, was released following a failed bid by a rival group of pirates to seize the huge ransom payment by force.
