The European Union’s anti-piracy force says pirates firing small arms and rocket-propelled grenades have attacked and captured an oil tanker in the eastern Gulf of Aden.
The EU force says the MV Zirku was attacked Monday by two pirate skiffs while sailing to Singapore from Sudan. It says the ship is Kuwaiti-owned.
Officials in Kuwait denied that the tanker is Kuwaiti-owned. The Reuters news agency quotes a Gulf industry source as saying the vessel is owned and operated by the Arab Maritime Petroleum Transport Company, which provides transport services for the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries .
The EU force says the ship was carrying 29 crew members, including 17 Pakistanis and nationals of seven other countries. No other information about the crew or the cargo was available.
Over the past several years, pirates based in Somalia have received hundreds of millions of dollars in ransom payments after hijacking ships, including several oil tankers.