New Delhi: Making it clear that India will not tolerate any piracy in Arabian Sea and is committed to safeguarding the sea lanes of communication, the marine commandos of Indian Navy today boarded 88000 tonnes bulk carrier MV Lila Norfolk east of Socotra islands after UK Maritime Traffic Organisation reported that the ship was hijacked by pirates. The Liberian bulk carrier was transporting cargo from Brazil to Bahrain. According to latest information, the Marcos have currently boarded the ship. The crew has come out of the safe house and no pirates have been found.
The Indian Navy had deployed a warship and an aircraft to monitor and assist a Liberian-flagged merchant vessel, with several Indian crew members. (File)
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Once the UKMTO reported that the vessel had been hijacked, the Indian Navy diverted its guided missile destroyer INS Chennai from south of Socotra and intercepted the ship with the help of Integral helicopter, Sea Guardian drone and Boeing P8I anti-submarine warfare aircraft. According to top sources, the operation is still on but the vessel is proceeding towards Bahrain. It is understood that Indian crew aboard the Liberian tanker went immediately into the safe house once the pirate alarm was sounded by UKMTO.
India currently has deployed four destroyers -- INS Kochi, INS Kolkata, INS Mormugao and INS Chennai -- as well as Talwar-class frigates and missile boats in Arabian sea to ensure maritime security.
India's elite marine commandos have boarded the hijacked Liberian ship MV Lila Norfolk in the North Arabian Sea, the Indian Navy said on Friday, adding they have commenced what it called ‘sanitisation’.
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India's elite marine commandos have boarded the hijacked Liberian ship MV Lila Norfolk in the North Arabian Sea, the Indian Navy said on Friday, adding they have commenced what it called ‘sanitisation’.
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"The Indian Navy Marine Commandos present onboard the Mission Deployed warship boarded the MV and have commenced the sanitisation," it said
The Navy said in a statement that INS Chennai, diverted from her anti-piracy patrol, had intercepted the ship on January 5.
According to reports, the ship had reported five-six armed assailants who boarded 460 nautical miles east of Eyl in Somalia.
Shishir Gupta is Executive Editor at Hindustan Times and one of India's top journalists covering national security, strategic affairs, foreign policy and geopolitics. Over the past three decades, he has extensively reported on India's military, diplomatic and security landscape, covering every major conflict and national security challenge, from the 1999 Kargil War and the 2020 East Ladakh standoff to Operation Sindoor in 2025. He has also covered major terror attacks, including the IC-814 hijacking, the 26/11 Mumbai attacks and the 2025 Pahalgam terror strike, along with numerous Pakistan-backed terrorist incidents in the Kashmir Valley and across India. He has reported on national and state elections for more than three decades. A recognised authority on strategic affairs, Gupta has covered India's nuclear programme since the Pokhran-II (Shakti series) tests in May 1998 and has written extensively on global nuclear issues, Indian diplomacy and the country's expanding global outreach. He has also reported widely on international conflicts and terrorism, with a special focus on the Indian subcontinent. Gupta has interviewed Prime Minister Narendra Modi more than four times, including Modi's first interview with the print media after becoming Prime Minister in May 2014. His other interviews include three with the Dalai Lama, as well as conversations with Benjamin Netanyahu, Amit Shah, Yogi Adityanath, S. Jaishankar, Nirmala Sitharaman and Piyush Goyal. He is the author of Indian Mujahideen: The Enemy Within (Hachette, 2011) and Himalayan Face-off: Chinese Assertion and Indian Riposte (Hachette, 2014). He was awarded the Chevening-Wolfson Joint Scholarship at Wolfson College, University of Cambridge, UK, in 1998 and participated in the International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) of the US State Department in 2006. He received the Ben Gurion Prize from Israel in 2011 and the K. Subrahmanyam Prize for Strategic Studies in 2015 from the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (MP-IDSA). Since 2024, he has hosted Point Blank, Hindustan Times' weekly YouTube show on global geopolitics.
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Home/India News/Exclusive details of marine commando operation: 'Crew comes out of safe house'
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