U.S. helps overtake Somalia pirates

NAIROBI, Kenya — A U.S. Navy destroyer helped sailors who retook control of their vessel Tuesday in a deadly battle with pirates after the North Korean-flagged ship was hijacked in the piracy-plagued waters off Somalia, the U.S. military said.

The Navy also confirmed other U.S. warships sank two pirate skiffs late Sunday after answering a distress call from a hijacked Japanese chemical tanker and said U.S. ships were still monitoring that vessel.

In Tuesday's incident, a helicopter flew from the destroyer USS James E. Williams to investigate a phoned-in tip of a hijacked ship and demanded by radio that the pirates give up their weapons, the military said.

The crew of the Dai Hong Dan then overwhelmed the hijackers, leaving two pirates dead, according to preliminary reports, and five captured, the military said.

"When we get a distress call, we help," said Cmdr. Lydia Robertson, spokeswoman for the U.S. 5th Fleet in Manama, Bahrain.

Defense Department spokesman Geoff Morrell said the incident didn't indicate the U.S. military was taking a more aggressive stance toward pirates off Somalia, but he added piracy in the Horn of Africa region is a concern because "you're talking about an area that has seen greater terrorist involvement."

Morrell said it was logical the military would want to know "what is being transported on the high seas and who is out there operating and if they have nothing but the best intentions in mind."

Andrew Mwangura, program coordinator of the Seafarers Assistance Program, said an estimated 22 crew members were aboard the North Korea-flagged ship that gunmen seized late Monday in Somali waters. His group independently monitors piracy. Workers at the Mogadishu port said the vessel had delivered a load of sugar from India.

An international watchdog reported this month that pirate attacks worldwide jumped 14 percent in the first nine months of 2007, with the biggest increases in the poorly policed waters of Somalia and Nigeria.

Reported attacks in Somali waters rose to 26, up from eight a year earlier, the London-based International Maritime Bureau said through its piracy reporting center in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

The U.S. Navy said that warships in a coalition monitoring the waters near Somalia were after the hijacked Japanese tanker Golden Nori and that four other vessels were still controlled by pirates near Somalia.

Robertson, the 5th Fleet spokesman, said coalition ships, including the guided-missile destroyer USS Porter, fired on and sank two pirate skiffs tied to the Golden Nori on Sunday night.