Lankans escape from Somali pirates

The 11 crew members including two Sri Lankans on a ship hijacked by Somali pirates nearly four years ago finally escaped on Saturday in the longest-running Somali hostage ordeal.

The crew of the MV Albedo was facing their first hours of freedom after three years and seven months as

The crew of the MV Albedo was facing their first hours of freedom after three years and seven months as hostages, during which their pirate captors often used torture

hostages, during which their pirate captors often used torture.

The men escaped with the help of some of their pirate captors in the early hours of Friday morning and fled to a nearby village where they were taken in by governmentaffiliated militia, a senior Somali anti-piracy official told The Telegraph.

“Few of them had shoes, some had only their underclothes, but they managed to escape through a window and reach a place of safety,” said Omar Sheikh Ali Osoble, counter-piracy focal point for the Galmudug regional administration.

“We put them in a hotel last night. They had air-conditioning and hot water and all of them were happy this morning. They were not in a bad condition, but they told us stories of their experiences which were terrible,” he said.

“Some of them were beaten very badly. Sometimes t hey were forced to call their people at home t o say t hey needed money to be released and they were close to dying and they were beaten while they were on the telephone. All of them are so happy to be free.”

Early on in the hijacking, one was shot dead by the pirates in an apparent fit of anger after negotiations with the ship’s owners broke down.

Last summer, the vessel sank in a storm, resulting in five of the crew drowning along with five of the pirates as they abandoned ship.

Some of them were beaten very badly. Sometimes they were forced to call their people at home to say they needed money to be released and they were close to dying and they were beaten while they were on the telephone. All of them are so happy to be free

The 11 seamen who managed to escape were transferred to a ramshackle house near the Somali port of Hobyo, a notorious pirate haven, where they have been held ever since.

They were expected to be flown to the Kenyan capital, Nairobi.

“They have lost a lot of weight, but otherwise seem in reasonable health and in good spirits, which is remarkable considering what t hey been through,” said one source.

The Albedo, a Malaysianflagged container ship, was originally captured in November 2010 with a crew of 23 from Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Iran and Pakistan.

Rather than pay the $8 million ransom demanded by the pirates, the ship’s Iranian owners, who are thought to have been uninsured, simply went to ground, officials involved in the case told The Telegraph last year.

The Pakistani crew members were freed after a Pakistani businessman raised a $1.2 million ransom payment. But no similar funds were forthcoming for t heir fellow crew members, despite terrifying accounts emerging of the men’s mistreatment by their captors as they tried to raise the pressure. Some of the seamen were beaten with gun butts, locked in containers and had the skin of their palms torn with pliers.

At one point, the entire crew was packed into an empty swimming pool without food or water for three days.

The ship’s Captain, Jawad Khan, bore the brunt of the hijackers’ anger as he tried to keep them calm. On one occasion, he was tied up and lowered into the sea as pirates sprayed bullets around him.