As announced by the Program for Development of Sea Travel in East Africa, at 4:00am this morning, Somali pirates seized a Greek trading ship, which was sailing southwest of the Seychelles. The ship MT Ariana was sailing under a Maltese flag and it has a crew of 24 people, all of whom are from Ukraine. Andrew Muangoura, director of the Program announced for Reuters that the capture happened north of Madagascar. It is believed that the crew is in good health condition.

The ship MT Ariana is owned by the Greek company All Oceans and its management is done by Seven Seas Maritime, which is headquartered in London. The ship was transporting 35 000 tons of soya from Brazil to the Middle East.

Few hours earlier, a Portuguese military ship averted the abduction of a Norwegian tanker in the Gulf of Aden. Saturday was a very lively day for the Somali pirates, who managed to capture also one British trade ship, which was traveling in the Indian Ocean.