Mogadishu, 10 June 2009 (Somalilandpress) – Report on telephone interview with Mario Iarloi, captain of Italian tug Buccaneer seized by pirates off Somali coast, in Las Qorey, Somalia, by Massimo A. Alberizzi in Nairobi; date not given: “‘Rescue Us or We Will Die of Privation”]

Nairobi – [This is the account of] a dramatic phone call with Mario Iarloi, captain of the Buccaneer, the Italian ship seized by Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden on 11 April while it was towing two empty barges. The vessel, owned by Ravenna-based company Micoperi Marine Contractors, is riding at anchor of Las Qorey, a fishing village in Puntland, in the northern part of the former Italian colony.

Living conditions are tragic, and the high-sea tug’s crew (10 Italians, a Croat, and five Romanians) feels left in the lurch. Several sailors are sick, and they are all on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Six of the 16 sailors have been taken ashore and probably distributed among various villages along the coast, in order to hide them in the event of an unlikely swoop by Italian special troops. So it is going to be more difficult to get them back when the time comes for their release. Their names are not known.

“Rescue us or we will ask them to shoot us,” the captain said in despair, in a voice that sounded as though it were hoarse with tears. He went on: “We are falling ill; some people are suffering from depression, others from heart condition; there are no medical supplies. Medical supplies arrived some time ago (one of the crew members suffers from a heart condition – Corriere della Sera editor’s note) but in this never-ending story the drugs are almost finished. I am not a medic; there are no medics; I cannot treat people when I do not even know what is ailing them, or else I would have to treat them just by looking them in the eye. Or noticing that they are losing their minds. They no longer manage to speak like reasonable people. In fact, I am losing my reason too.”

Captain Iarloi, aged 51 from Ortona, tried to reason: “It is an absurd situation and we do not have the strength to carry on. Some people are losing their minds. There is no longer anything to eat. Only a very little, to keep us alive. We use sea water to wash with. We have gone beyond the end of our tether. Please rescue us from this situation, otherwise we ourselves will ask them to kill us. They too (the jailers – Corriere della Sera editor’s note) are nervous and they open fire every now and then. It happened again today. A bullet almost grazed my head. We cannot take any more and we want to go home; and we want to go home at once. We spend six hours on the bridge without any air conditioning (the heat is unbearable in that region and temperatures frequently rise above 40 degrees [Celsius] – Corriere della Sera editor’s note).”

During the phone call, the captain of the Buccaneer (which, by an ironic twist of fate, is the English word for “pirate”) said that there is no more drinking water on board (”we drink boiled water”) nor is there any food (”we eat rice and bread that the cook cooks for us”). He also denied that the victuals which were sent in a truck from Djibouti were ever delivered (”we have received nothing”), despite assurances that they did reach their destination.

The captain said that he knows nothing about any negotiations: “They do not tell us about that. If no negotiations are in hand, then they should start negotiating, they should telephone these gentlemen.” At this point Iarloi said: “And we are sick and tired of being on this ship. I cannot take it any more and I will hand you over to the person next to me,” in other words to the pirate who speaks Italian. It was precisely he who assured Corriere della Sera a couple of days ago that no negotiations are under way. “These men,” he said, referring to the hostages in a somewhat nervous manner, “want to go home, but no one has contacted us.”

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