Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar will travel to the United Kingdom from August 24 to 28, where he is scheduled to meet the secretary-general of the International Maritime Organisation to press for the release of Pakistani crew members held by Somali pirates for more than four months, Pakistan’s Foreign Office said.
What the Visit Covers
According to a curtain-raiser issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Dar will meet UK Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband and Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office Minister of State for Pakistan Stephen Doughty, along with other senior UK government officials, during the five-day visit. He is also scheduled to meet Commonwealth Secretary-General Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey and engage with British parliamentarians and members of the British-Pakistani community.
The Foreign Office said Dar’s meeting with the IMO secretary-general will focus specifically on the case of the MT Honour 25, a Palau-flagged oil tanker hijacked by armed pirates roughly 30 nautical miles off Somalia’s semi-autonomous Puntland region on April 21.
Ten Pakistanis Among the Hostages
The tanker was carrying 17 crew members when it was seized, including 10 Pakistanis. The rest of the crew includes seven Indonesians, among them the ship’s captain, along with an Indian and a Sri Lankan national. Families of the hostages have said conditions aboard the vessel have steadily deteriorated during the more than four months of captivity, with earlier reports describing shortages of food, water and medicine.
Pakistan’s Foreign Office has said the government remains in contact with the ship’s owner, who is understood to be the principal negotiator with the pirates, and that those negotiations have continued with the knowledge of the Somali government. Officials have previously cited the ship’s cargo and its location as factors complicating any law-enforcement operation to secure the crew’s release.
Part of a Wider Diplomatic Push
Pakistani officials, including Maritime Affairs Minister Junaid Anwar Chaudhry, have held repeated conversations with Dar in recent weeks urging faster progress on the case. Dar has separately raised the matter directly with Somalia’s foreign minister, who assured him of Mogadishu’s continued efforts to secure the hostages’ release.
By raising the case directly with the IMO, the UN agency responsible for the safety and security of international shipping, Pakistan is seeking to add international weight to a negotiation that has so far produced no breakthrough since the tanker was seized in April.
