Indian Navy intercepts hijacking of merchant vessel in Arabian Sea

Indian Navys marine commandos on Friday boarded a hijacked Liberianflagged commercial bulk carrier in the North Arabian Sea and are undertaking a sanitisation operation Navy officials saidThe Navy deployed a warship maritime patrol aircraft P8I and longrange Predator MQ9B drone in response to the hijacking of commercial vessel MV Lila Norfolk that is understood to have over a dozen Indian crew membersNavy officials said frontline warship INS Chennai was diverted from her antipiracy patrol and it intercepted the hijacked vessel at 315 pm in the North Arabian SeaThe vessel was kept under continuous surveillance using maritime patrol aircraft P8I and Predator MQ9B drones the officials saidThe Indian Navys marine commandos present onboard the mission deployed warship boarded the merchant vessel and have commenced the sanitisation operation said an officialMV Lila Norfolk sent a message on the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations UKMTO portal indicating that five to six unknown armed personnel boarded the vessel on Thursday eveningEarlier the Navy said the overall situation is being closely monitored in coordination with other maritime agencies in the regionThe hijacking incident comes amid growing concerns over Houthi militants stepping up attacks on merchant vessels in the Red Sea amid the IsraelHamas conflictThe Navy said it responded swiftly to the developing situation and deployed a maritime patrol aircraft and diverted INS Chennai for security of MV Lila NorfolkResponding swiftly to the developing situation Indian Navy launched a maritime patrol aircraft and has diverted INS Chennai deployed for maritime security operations to assist the vessel it said in a statementThough there is no clarity from the Navy on the nationality of the crew it is learnt that over a dozen of them are IndiansThe Indian Navy remains committed to ensuring safety of merchant shipping in the region along with international partners and friendly foreign countries the Navy saidThe UKMTO is a British military organisation that tracks movements of various vessels in strategic waterwaysThe fresh incident is among a series of such maritime incidents witnessed in the strategic waters in the last few weeksLiberianflagged vessel MV Chem Pluto with 21 Indian crew members was the target of a drone attack off Indias west coast on December 23Besides MV Chem Pluto another commercial oil tanker that was on the way to India came under a suspected drone strike in the Southern Red Sea on the same day The vessel had a team of 25 Indian crewIn another incident Maltaflagged vessel MV Ruen was hijacked on December 14 by piratesThe Indian Navy on Wednesday said it continues to monitor the maritime security situation in the North and Central Arabian Sea and Gulf of AdenIndian Naval ships and aircraft remain mission deployed for maintaining enhanced surveillance and undertaking maritime security operations it saidIn the last one week Indian Naval Task Groups deployed in the area have investigated large number of fishing vessels and boarded vessels of interest it addedThe task groups comprised warships surveillance planes and remotelypiloted aircraftThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever