Near the shores of Nigeria, pirates attacked the container ship Demeter. Six sailors, including a Ukrainian citizen, were taken prisoner. Negotiations on the release of hostages are being held with the participation of the Nigerian authorities and representatives of the flag state.
The incident occurred on October 21, 2017, around 6:00 local time, 40 nautical miles south of the Nigerian island of Bonnie and the port of Port Harcourt. The ship was bound for Liberia from Equatorial Guinea. A boat with eight armed pirates approached the container ship Demeter when it was in the Gulf of Biafra. The attackers landed aboard and, threatening with weapons, captured the coca, the boatswain, the second assistant, the second mechanic, the captain and the hostman. One of the captured crew members is a citizen of Ukraine, another one is & ndash; citizen of Hungary, the other four & ndash; Filipinos. After the attackers with captured seamen left the ship, the container ship with 12 crew members continued on its way.
Not so long ago, the Nigerian authorities said they are actively and effectively fighting pirates in Nigerian territorial waters, and shipowners do not need to hire additional armed guards. Meanwhile, according to the information of the International Maritime Bureau & nbsp; (IMB), over nine months of 2017, more than twenty cases of attacks on merchant ships have been recorded off the coast of Nigeria. During the same period, 39 crew members were captured as a result of pirate attacks. IMB warns: pirates are often well armed, and routes along the shores of Nigeria remain extremely dangerous for sailors.
Container ship Demeter, DWT = 41.647, built in 2005, runs under the flag of Liberia and is owned by the Hamburg shipping company Peter Dohle Schiffahrts-KG
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