Indian naval forces have rescued 19 Pakistani sailors after their fishing vessel was hijacked by pirates off Somalia’s coast.

This was the second rescue operation in 36 hours by Indian warship INS Sumitra.

Hours earlier, the ship had rescued the 17-member Iranian crew of a vessel which was additionally hijacked by pirates, the navy stated.

India’s navy has responded to a number of misery calls from vessels and sailors over the previous few weeks.

Recent assaults on vessels off Somalia’s coast have triggered considerations that pirates might be changing into lively once more within the area.

INS Sumitra has been deployed for maritime safety operations alongside the east coast of Somalia and Gulf of Aden.

A navy assertion stated that the ship had responded to a misery message on 28 January and intercepted an Iranian-flagged vessel. Naval officers then “coerce[d] the pirates for safe release of crew along with the boat”, in accordance with a submit on X (previously Twitter).

Once the 17 crew members had been launched, the ship was sanitised and allowed to proceed its journey. The assertion didn’t point out the standing of the pirates.

On Tuesday, the navy stated INS Sumitra was once more “pressed into action to locate and intercept another Iranian-flagged fishing vessel Al Naeemi”.

Navy personnel boarded the vessel to sanitise the vessel and test on the well-being of the crew, it added.

The standing of the pirates was not talked about once more, however a photograph posted on X confirmed armed Navy personnel guarding males who had their palms tied behind their backs.

On Saturday, defence forces from the Seychelles had rescued six Sri Lankan fishermen after their vessel was hijacked.

According to a Bloomberg report, the rise in piracy off Somalia’s coast is linked to the disruption in maritime safety on account of a series of attacks on ships within the Red Sea by the Houthis, an Iran-backed insurgent group.

On 26 January, the Indian Navy stated it deployed its warship INS Visakhapatnam within the Gulf of Aden in response to a misery name from Marlin Luanda, a tanker with hyperlinks to the UK that was on hearth for a number of hours after being hit by a missile fired by the Houthis. French and US naval ships additionally offered help to the vessel.

And earlier in January, Indian navy commandos had rescued 21 crew members from a Liberian-flagged ship which was attacked by pirates off the Somalian coast.