Missing cargo ship found near Cape Verde - UPDATES

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                                      Ship passes through Channel and then disappears






         
Jennifer Quinn,
Associated Press Writer
Aug.12, 200
LONDON

– First the ship reported it had been attacked in waters off Sweden. Then it sailed with no apparent problems through one of the world's busiest shipping lanes. And then it disappeared.

The Arctic Sea, a Maltese-flagged cargo ship, was supposed to make port in Algeria with its cargo of timber on Aug. 4. More than a week later, there's no sign of the ship or its Russian crew.

Piracy has exploded off the coast of lawless Somalia — but could this be an almost unheard of case of sea banditry in European waters?

"If this is a criminal act, it appears to be following a new business model," Marine intelligence expert Graeme Gibbon-Brooks told Sky News on Wednesday.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev ordered the country's defense minister on Wednesday to take "all necessary measures" to find the missing cargo ship and, if necessary, to free its crew, the Kremlin said. Wives and other relatives of the crew members issued an appeal to the Russian government to carry out a full-scale rescue mission, using all of Russia's special services.

The mystery began on July 24, when the 15 crew members of the Arctic Sea said they were tied up and beaten by a group of up to 10 men who boarded the ship off the Swedish island of Oland. The masked men identified themselves as police officers — but Swedish police said they hadn't been searching ships in that area.

Swedish police investigator Ingemar Isaksson said the crew then claimed that the men left the ship 12 hours later in a high-speed inflatable boat.

"We were very puzzled when we first heard about this," Isaksson said then. "I have never heard of anything like this in Swedish waters."

On July 28, the Arctic Sea made contact with British maritime authorities as it passed through the busy English Channel. The ship made a routine, mandatory report — saying who they were, where they were from, where they were going and what their cargo was. It appeared routine, said Mark Clark of Britain's Maritime and Coastguard Agency.

He said the agency is "extremely curious" about what happened to the ship.

"It's bizarre," he said. "There is no coastguard I know who can remember anything like this happening."

Where the ship was next spotted is uncertain. Russian media reports say the last contact was on July 30 when the ship was in the Bay of Biscay, and that it was later spotted by a Portuguese patrol plane, but there was no contact.

But Portuguese Navy spokesman Commander Joao Barbosa said "we can guarantee that the ship is not in Portuguese waters nor did it ever pass through Portuguese waters."

The cargo was shipped by Finnish wood supplier Rets Timber, and is worth 1.3 million euros ($1.84 million), the company said.

"We have no idea where the ship is," company managing director Kari Naumanen told the AP in Helsinki.

Experts are very concerned about the vessel and crew, but at the same time are wary of attributing the disappearance to armed bandits.

"There have been no attacks in European waters," said Pottengal Mukundan, director of the London-based International Maritime Bureau. "It's not the kind of area where pirates would find it easy to operate."

Nick Davis, the chief executive of the Merchant Maritime Warfare Centre, told the BBC that if anything had happened to the ship, cargo would have been found.

"I strongly suspect that this is probably a commercial dispute with its owner and a third party and they've decided to take matters into their own hands," he said Wednesday.

Pirate attacks off Somalia's lawless coast are a far more familiar occurrence. Pirates have launched more than 100 attacks this year in the Gulf of Aden, one of the world's busiest shipping lanes, and are currently holding about a dozen vessels.

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Associated Press writers Lynn Berry in Moscow, Matti Huuhtanen in Helsinki and Barry Hatton in Lisbon contributed to this report.

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In this Dec. 29, 2008 photo the cargo ship the Arctic Sea is seen in Kotka, Finland.

The Arctic Sea, a Maltese-flagged cargo ship, was supposed to make port in Algeria with its cargo of timber on August 4. More than a week later, there's no sign of the ship or its Russian crew.



(AP Photo
/Pekka Laakso
/Lehitukuva)
Photo Tools

[Bianca]

                                          Missing cargo ship found near Cape Verde





Writer Lynn Berry,
Associated Press Writer
Aug. 14, 2009
MOSCOW

– A Russian-manned cargo ship that vanished last month in the Atlantic was found Friday near Cape Verde off the coast of West Africa, according to French and Russian officials. There was no immediate information about the condition of the crew or whether there was anyone else on board.

The Arctic Sea — carrying a load of timber and 15 Russian sailors — disappeared after passing through the English Channel on July 28. The Maltese-flagged freighter sent radio messages as it sailed along the coasts of France and Portugal, but then all contact was lost.

"Cape Verde coast guards said they have located the boat" about 520 miles (840 kilometers) off Cape Verde, said French Defense Ministry spokesman Capt. Jerome Baroe. France was involved in search efforts together with several other countries.

Two military officials in Brussels separately confirmed the ship had been tracked and located off West Africa. The officials asked not to be named while the operation was ongoing.

Russian naval ships were ordered to pursue the ship after the Cape Verde coast guard reported the freighter was outside the country's territorial waters to the north, Russian Ambassador to Cape Verde Alexander Karpushin told The Associated Press.

The ambassador did not say when the naval ships were expected to arrive in the area. The four ships involved in the search, including a frigate, had entered the Atlantic late Tuesday. Their whereabouts Friday were unknown.

It also was unclear whether the freighter had laid anchor or was continuing to sail south. It had enough food and fuel to last through the end of the month, the ship's Russian operator said.

The ship's crew had reported a June 24 attack in Swedish waters by up to a dozen masked men, who they said tied them up, questioned them about drug trafficking, beat them and searched the freighter before leaving 12 hours later in a high-speed inflatable boat.

The alleged attack, unusual in itself, raised further concerns because it was not reported until the freighter had passed through Britain's busy shipping lanes and was heading out into the wide Atlantic. There have been fears that some of the attackers might still be aboard.

The Arctic Sea, which left from Finland on June 23, had been due to make port Aug. 4 in Algeria with its euro1.3 million ($1.8 million) haul of timber.

The European Commission suggested the ship may have come under attack a second time. "Radio calls were apparently received from the ship, which had supposedly been under attack twice, the first time off the Swedish coast and then off the Portuguese coast," said commission spokesman Martin Selmayr. He said he could add no further comment so as not to hinder the ongoing law enforcement activities.

The Portuguese Foreign Ministry said, however, that the ship was never in Portuguese territorial waters.

The ship's operator, Solchart Arkhangelsk, said it had no information about a possible second attack. Company officials said all attempts to communicate with the crew have failed.

The ship's captain is 50-year-old Sergei Zaretsky, a veteran of such sea voyages, said Solchart deputy director Ivan Boiko. All of the sailors are from Arkhangelsk, a port city in the far northwest of Russia.

French maritime authorities said they received radio messages on July 29 as the ship sailed past the north coast of France. The Arctic Sea's report to British maritime authorities as it passed through the Dover Strait, one of the world's busiest shipping lanes, was the last known voice contact with the crew.

Speculation on what might have happened to the ship has ranged from suspicions that it was carrying secret cargo — possibly narcotics — to theories about a commercial dispute. Security experts have been wary of attributing its disappearance to bandits, noting that piracy is almost unheard of in European waters.

"It would seem that these acts, such as they have been reported, have nothing in common with 'traditional' acts of piracy or armed robbery at sea," Selmayr said.

David Osler, a maritime journalist at Lloyd's List in London, said there are three main types of piracy. There is the sort seen in Somalia, where a gang takes the ship and the captain, and demands a ransom in return for release.

In the Far East, criminals would steal the entire ship, repaint it and trade it — creating what are called "phantom ships," Osler said in an interview.

And in less developed areas, piracy has sometimes been more like armed robbery, he said, noting that ships often carry cash around for necessities while traveling. "It's like holding up the local liquor store," he said. "It's just for cash."

Osler said the 18-year-old Arctic Sea was not particularly valuable. "The ship isn't really worth stealing," he said, noting most such ships have a life of 20-25 years.

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Associated Press writers

Maria Danilova
in Paris,

Vladimir Isachenkov
in Moscow,

Slobodan Lekic
in Brussels and

Jennifer Quinn
in London

contributed to this report.