KARACHI, Aug 27: At least seven Pakistani seafarers, including a captain and a chief engineer, who were sailing off the African coast in two ships, have been missing for over two months, Dawn has learnt. The sailors’ union suspects that they and other crew members have been taken hostage by pirates.
Sources say that the Pakistani government has done little to locate the missing men, despite numerous appeals by worried family members and the Pakistan Seamen’s Union.
Reportedly, Captain Khalid Slah Siddiqui and Chief Engineer Zafar Iqbal were sailing on M.V. Reef Azania (IMO No. 8413318) with four Indian and eight Tanzanian crew. The ship, owned by Dubai-based M/s Zamdez Shipping and registered at St. Vincent, left Dubai in mid-June for the Seychelles. Family members of Siddiqui and Iqbal say that they were recruited by the Karachi-based Dennab Shipping (Pvt), and the last contact these sailors had with their family was on June 24. They have been untraceable since then.
Interestingly, this ship was attacked by pirates earlier, some 300 nautical miles off the Kenyan coast on May 20, 2007. The incident has been reported in the 2nd Quarterly 2007 Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships Report prepared by the London-based International Chamber of Commerce (ICC)’s International Maritime Bureau.
The second missing ship had five Pakistani sailors on board, in addition to 16 Indian and a Bangladeshi colleague. Chief Engineer Farrukh Saeed, 2nd Engineer Fazl-ur-Rehman, 2nd officer Khan Bahadur Qureshi, cook Faizan and welder/fitter Mohammed Hanif were on M.V. Infinity Marine I (earlier called M.V. Redline I) (IMO No. 7915618), bound for Somalia from Ajman. Registered in Panama, the ship was constructed in 1984 and is owned by the Dubai-based Infinity Marine Services.
The Pakistani sailors were recruited by Karachi-based Sea Care (Pvt), and the last communication received by their families was in the first week of June.
A July 14 communication between Infinity Marine owner Fida Hussain and Sea Care says: “With reference to our telephone conversations kindly note that the ship Infinity Marine I is still missing, without any conclusive evidence pertaining to its fate. While we are trying every possibility; kindly try to find out if any of the crew members’ families have heard from them in last 15 days [….]”
The chief of the Pakistan Seamen’s Union, Adam Panjri, told Dawn that the sailors had been taken hostage by the pirates who operate freely off the African coast, particularly near Somalia. He said that his organisation has been approaching various relevant government and international agencies but nothing concrete has surfaced so far. “The officials have only written letters,” he said.
