MOGADISHU (Somaliguardian) – A man identifying himself as one of the Somali pirates holding the hijacked cargo vessel M/V LUTUF off the coast of Somalia told local media he came from the United States and intends to return there once he receives his share of the ransom, in an interview that also disputed official accounts of what the ship is carrying.
The Cameroon-flagged LUTUF, owned by Polar Movement Shipping, was seized on August 17 roughly three and a half nautical miles off Marraya in Puntland’s Eyl district by eight armed men. Somali officials and the vessel’s owners have said the ship was carrying weapons, communications and satellite equipment bound for a Turkish military training facility in Mogadishu. Its ten-member crew includes six Indian nationals, one Turkish national, one Georgian and two Serbian security guards.
Speaking to local media, the man disputed that account of the cargo. He said the ship is instead carrying weapons, armored military vehicles and cement, and denied it was carrying communications equipment as previously reported. He went further, alleging that the vessel was chartered by “mercenaries” and that its weapons were destined for mercenary groups rather than for the Turkish military base in Mogadishu, as has been widely reported. Neither claim has been independently verified, and it could not be confirmed whether the man had firsthand knowledge of the ship’s manifest or cargo documentation.
The man said Somali parliament speaker Abdulkadir Mohamed Nur had contacted the pirates directly and warned them that they would be killed on the spot if they did not release the ship. He argued that the outreach itself undercut the official narrative linking the cargo to Turkey, reasoning that if the weapons belonged to Turkey, Turkish officials – not a Somali parliamentary figure – would be the ones negotiating. This account, like the others attributed to him, could not be independently corroborated, and Somali Guardian has not confirmed that this individual holds or held the position described.
In the most unexpected part of the interview, the man said he was originally from the United States and planned to return there after collecting his portion of the ransom. He said he would give 90 percent of his share to poor people, saying he personally had no need for the money. Somali Guardian could not independently verify his nationality, identity or the ransom-distribution claim, and no US, Somali or Puntland authority has commented on it.
Competing accounts of the airstrikes
The hijacking has been followed by a string of unclaimed airstrikes in the waters and coastline near where the LUTUF was taken. An August 18 strike near Garmaal in Puntland’s Dangoroyo district killed four men after a small boat delivered supplies to the hijacked vessel and turned back toward shore; Puntland authorities identified the dead as civilian fishermen, while initial reports had described them as suspected pirates. A further strike on August 24 in the Jiifle area of Godob-Jiraan district killed at least nine people, according to local officials, again with no country or military force claiming responsibility.
Local media reports say Turkish naval vessels have surrounded the LUTUF and have called on the pirates to release the ship in exchange for safe passage. Turkey has not publicly confirmed carrying out any of the strikes; asked about an earlier incident, its foreign ministry told the BBC it had no information about the operation.
Puntland’s government has said the civilian toll from the strikes threatens to damage cooperation between its security forces and international partners fighting piracy, and has demanded that the countries responsible for the strikes explain them. The Somali federal government, by contrast, has maintained that those killed were pirates and has defended the strikes attributed to Turkey. The two positions remain unreconciled, and no independent investigation has yet established the identities of those killed in either strike.
The status of the LUTUF, its crew and its cargo remained unclear as of Thursday. Somali Guardian will update this story as the account of the pirate’s claims, the parliament speaker’s involvement and the airstrike death tolls are further verified.
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