The Indonesian Armed Forces (TNI) may send a special troop to free the crew on board the Sinar Kudus boat being held by pirates in Somalia. “We will process it,” TNI information center head, Admiral Iskandar Sitompul, told Tempo yesterday.

He said the TNI had heard from the media about the House of Representatives’ (DPR) call for TNI to free the hostages and deploy its military force. However, a direct request has not made to the TNI.

According to Iskandar, deploying a troop to release hostages is nothing new to the TNI. On March 31, 1981, for instance, the TNI managed to free 48 Garuda passengers held hostage at the Don Muang Airport in Thailand.

The Sinar Kudus was sailing from Pomala, Southeast Sulawesi, to Rotterdam, the Netherlands, when it was hijacked by the Somalia pirates near Socotra Islands, the Arab Peninsula, in mid March. The cargo was carrying nickel ore belonging to PT Aneka Tambang along with 20 Indonesian crew members. The cargo is now being held at Eil Beach, Somalia.

The presidential spokesperson for foreign affairs, Teuku Faizasyah, said the government had made efforts to free the crew since the hijack took place and had called on Samudera Indonesia as well as Aneka Tambang to cooperate.

Teuku said that rescue operations take time. He mentioned that the government took six months to free Indonesian citizens held by Somalia pirates in 2009 because the Somalia government could not tackle the pirates. “There are many armed groups in Somalia that live off piracy,” he said.

DPR defense commission member, DPR, T.B. Hasanuddin, said he hoped the government would prepare a military troop to secretly free the crew. He said the government could permit the formation of a special troop without involving the DPR because all of the components concerned fell under the executive body.

Hasanuddin said there were four options for the government; direct negotiation with the pirates, negotiations through the Somalia government, negotiation through a third party, or ambush by a command troop. “We will start with diplomacy. It that fails, we will ambush them,” he said.

Aneka Tambang’s corporate secretary Bimo Budi Satrio, said he was still waiting for the negotiation results between PT Samudera Indonesia as the cargo supplier and the pirates. He admitted that Wahana Tata, the insurance company partnering with Aneka Tambang, only insured the cargo content, while the crew is Samudera Indonesia’s responsibility.

“We are letting Samudera Indonesia negotiate with the pirates,” he said, adding that Samudera Indonesia was using a negotiator.

taken from Tempo Interactive

Popularity: 1% [?]