Merchant ship with 10 Filipino crew members hijacked off Yemen now held by Somali pirates

GAROWE, Somalia - A merchant ship hijacked in Yemeni waters in the Gulf of Aden last week is now being held by Somali pirates, two residents of Somalia's semi-autonomous Puntland region told Reuters on Thursday.

The ship, the MT Asana, is a Tanzanian-flagged fuel and chemical tanker.

One of the residents who spoke to Reuters described himself as a former pirate. He said there were 20 crew members on board the MT Asana, including eight from Germany and 10 from the Philippines.

Germany's foreign ministry said it did not comment on abductions of German nationals overseas as a matter of principle.

The other resident of Caluula in Puntland saw pirates transporting food to the hijacked ship.

United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations said last week that a vessel boarded by unauthorised personnel in the Gulf of Aden had been manoeuvred into Somali waters, classifying it as a hijack.

Somali pirates caused havoc in the waters off the Horn of Africa nation's long coastline between 2008 and 2018. After a lull, pirate activity started to pick up again in late 2023.

-Reporting by Abdiqani Hassan; Miranda Murray in BerlinAdditional reporting by Abdi Sheikh in Mogadishu and Writing by Elias Biryabarema and Ludwig BurgerEditing by Alexander Winning and Kevin Liffey/Reuters