Reuters) - Somali elders sought on Saturday to mediate between the U.S. navy and pirates demanding $2 million (1.4 million pounds) and safe passage in exchange for the release of an American captain they are holding on a lifeboat in the Indian Ocean.
Pirates preying on the strategic shipping lanes of the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean are holding about 260 hostages.
Following are the latest developments related to the piracy off the coast of Somalia.
April 11 - Pirates on a German ship with 24 foreign hostages returned to the Somali coast after failing to find fellow pirates who are holding American ship captain Richard Phillips captive adrift in a lifeboat in the Indian Ocean with U.S. naval ships closing in.
- Pirates seized a U.S.-owned and Italian-flagged tugboat with 16 crew on board, 10 of them Italian nationals.
- Pirates attacked a 26,000-tonne, Panama-flagged bulk carrier, the MV Anatolia, in the Gulf of Aden but were beaten back by sailors spraying them with water hoses.
April 10 - A French hostage was killed, but his wife, his son and another French couple were freed when French special forces attacked pirates who had seized their yacht off Somalia. Two of the pirates were shot dead.
- Pirates released the Norwegian-owned tanker MT Bow Asir, which was taken at the end of March. The 27-member crew were unharmed. The 23-tonne chemical tanker's operator declined to say whether a ransom was paid, though pirate sources said $2.4 million changed hands.
April 9 - A Spanish warship intercepted a small boat that had pursued a Panama-flagged merchant vessel in the Gulf of Aden. Spanish forces boarded the small boat and let the crew go after checking their registration papers.
(Compiled by the World Des
