Suspected Somali pirates seize tanker near Yemen amid wave of hijackings 

An oil tanker has been seized off the coast of Yemen, in an attack the country’s coastguard says was carried out by Somali pirates. It is the latest in a series of hijackings to re-emerge in the region this year.

The Yemeni coastguard said the Astana was seized about 26 nautical miles (48km) off Hadramawt province on Friday.

The UK’s maritime security agency, UKMTO, citing military sources, said there was an “illegal boarding” 65 nautical miles (120km) south of the port of Mukalla. It said the vessel was boarded by “unauthorised personnel”.

UKMTO urged vessels in the area to exercise caution and report suspicious activity, adding that the incident remained under investigation.

Early reports indicated a single person had been spotted near the vessel’s bridge and the tanker was moving slowly southeast towards Somalia.

Yemeni authorities said they were coordinating with international partners and maritime agencies in the area to verify the tanker’s condition and track its movements.

Naval vessels, including a Yemeni coastguard boat, were reported heading towards the ship, while aircraft flew reconnaissance sorties overhead.

The attack follows a marked resurgence in Somali piracy, which had been largely dormant for more than a decade until this year.

The Astana was seized in one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.

The Gulf of Aden feeds into the Red Sea and the Suez Canal, the fastest maritime link between Asia and Europe. Roughly 12 to 15 percent of global trade by value passes through the canal each year, along with about 30 percent of the world’s container traffic.

Between 2005 and 2012, Somali pirates were blamed for more than 1,000 attacks, worth approximately $400 million in ransom payments, prompting an international crackdown that all but ended hijackings by 2013.

The shipping industry formally lifted its “high risk” designation for the Indian Ocean in 2023, judging the threat sufficiently reduced.

However, since April, the French navy’s Mica Center has recorded 18 piracy incidents and hijackings, with at least three other vessels still held for ransom.

Analysts point to naval forces stretched thin by conflicts in the Red Sea and the Strait of Hormuz, shipping traffic pushed closer to Somali waters as vessels reroute and instability in Somalia itself as key drivers of the renewed threat.

Egypt‘s foreign ministry said late last month that through its embassies in Mogadishu and Riyadh, it was working to secure the release of Egyptian sailors held aboard the tanker Eureka which was seized off Somalia in May.

On Thursday, the EU’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, signed a Status of Forces Agreement with Djibouti, securing continued access and logistical support for ships and aircraft supporting its Atalanta and Aspides naval missions, which patrol the Red Sea and the Horn of Africa.

Speaking in Djibouti, whose shores straddle the Bab-al-Mandeb chokepoint, Kallas said the Aspides mission alone has protected more than 670 merchant vessels and rescued 128 seafarers in under two and a half years.