Several crew members, including a Polish sailor, were abducted during an attack on a Greek-owned container ship in the Gulf of Guinea, the Polish Foreign Ministry announced on Wednesday.
The Danish Navy announced this week that pirates had abducted six crew members of the MV Tønsberg ship in international waters off the island of Bioko, Equatorial Guinea.
The Polish Foreign Minister said that it "received information regarding the abduction of members of the crew of the Tønsberg ship in the Gulf of Guinea and confirms that one of the abducted persons is a Polish citizen".
Diplomats from "other countries", as well as with the ship-owning company, were contacted by the Poland to coordinate efforts to find and rescue hostages.
According to the Danish Ministry of Defence, the HDMS Esbern Snare frigate, which has been patrolling the area since November, chased the pirates after they kidnapped hostages from the Tønsberg and put them on a small escape boat.
A frigate helicopter followed them - from a distance, so as not to endanger the lives of the hostages - but was forced to stop when the pirates entered the territorial waters of Nigeria as the rules of engagement of the Danish Navy did not allow it to enter.
In addition to the six hostages, one injured person was rescued and received medical treatment on the frigate, while 14 other crew members are safe and still remain on the Tønsberg.
According to Marine Traffic, the Tønsberg is currently off the coast of Benin.
Attacks on ships aimed at abducting crew members for ransom have become more frequent in recent years in the Gulf of Guinea, which stretches 5,700 kilometers into West Africa.
Most pirates in this region are from Nigeria.
At the bottom of the Gulf, which stretches from Senegal to Angola, there are large deposits of hydrocarbons. The area is also rich in fish.
The area has become a global hub for illegal maritime activities: it accounted for 99% of pirate sailors' abductions in 2020, according to a report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime Prevention and the Stable Seas Research Institute. ,
Unironically, this report was released the day before the abduction of the Tønsberg ship.
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