Gulf
of Aden, Nov 19: Within days of preventing the
hijack of an Indian merchant vessel, Indian
Navy’s warship INS Tabar, after exchange
of fire, sank a pirate vessel off the Somali
coast.
According to reports,
the Indian Navy acted definitively after a group
of pirate vessels tried to encircle the Indian
warship with the motive to attack it. After
a brief exchange of light fire, the warship
hit the pirate vessel leading to its sinking.
The incident happened at around 9.45 pm Tuesday
night. No casualities were reported from the
Indian side.
The Indian warship, the
INS Tabar, was dispatched to the Gulf of Aden
in October after a spike in piracy and hijackings
off the coast of Somalia, which is caught up
in an Islamic insurgency and has had no functioning
government since 1991.
It is the third of the
Talwar-class frigates of the Indian Navy. INS
Tabar is the first vessel in the Talwar class
to be armed with supersonic BrahMos (PJ-10)
Anti-ship cruise missiles.
Meanwhile, another ship
has been hijacked in the Gulf of Aden waters.
The ship was flying a Hong Kong flag but is
operated by the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping
Lines. The status of the crew or its cargo remains
unknown.
NATO has also expressed
concerns about the growing incidences of piracy
in the crucial shipping lane along the Gulf
of Aden. The worldwide concern was triggered
after yesterday’s hijack of an Saudi oil
tanker – considered of the biggest- by
pirates in the same region.
The hijacking, in fact
led to a one dollar rise in the crude oil prices.
This is the second successful
strike by the Indian Navy within a week. It
may be noted that last Tuesday the Indian warship
foiled an attempt by the pirates to hijack an
Indian and a Saudi ship off the Somalian coast.
The incident happened when
the pirates on power-boats attacked Saudi Arabia-registered
merchant vessel "MV Timaha," and half
an hour later a second group tried to board
a 38,000-tonne bulk carrier owned by India's
Great Eastern Shipping Co
INS Tabar patrolling the
area responded to a distress call by "MV
Timaha" and sent an attack helicopter carrying
commandos which opened fire while the pirates
were making repeated attempts to board the Saudi
ship
This year has seen
a spurt in the pirates’ activities off
the Somalian coast and till now there have been
nearly 90 such attacks. In the last 12 days
itself they have hijacked seven ships in the
Gulf of Aden, the latest being an Iranian cargo
vessel
New
Delhi: His life is the kind of spectacle that television
thrives on. One reason perhaps is that Rahul Mahajan
understands television very well.
Amritsar,
November 18 Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi
condemned the anti-Sikh violence in the aftermath
of Indira Gandhi’s assassination, saying “whatever
happened was wrong”. 
Gulf
of Aden, Nov 19: Within days of preventing the hijack
of an Indian merchant vessel, Indian Navy’s
warship INS Tabar, after exchange of fire, sank
a pirate vessel off the Somali coast. 
NEW
DELHI: Finance minister P Chidambaram on Tuesday
called on sectors like housing, automobiles, hotels
and airlines to cut prices to boost demand 
NEW
DELHI: Citigroup on Tuesday decided to cut 53,000
more jobs, triggering fears of more layoffs across
industries. A lowdown on some sectors and companies
which are on a hiring spree (TOI) 
