Factbox — Ships held by Somali pirates

Somali pirates have released a fishing vessel and fuel oil tanker seized in March, a maritime official said today.

"UBT Ocean and Sakoba are both free," Andrew Mwangura of the East African Seafarers' Assistance Programme said.

The UBT Ocean, seized on March 5, was carrying fuel oil from the United Arab Emirates to Tanzania and had a crew of 21. The 9,000-deadweight tanker is owned by Norwegian company Brovigtank.

The Spanish-owned Sakoba carried 10 Kenyans, one Spaniard, one Pole, one Cape Verdean, a Namibian and two Senegalese.

Here is a list of ships under the control of Somali pirates:

* Socotra 1: Seized on December 25, 2009. The Yemeni-owned ship was captured in the Gulf of Aden after it left the port of Al-Shahr in Yemen. There were six Yemeni crew on board.

* Al Nisr Al Saudi: Seized on March 1, 2010. The Saudi Arabian-owned 5,136 deadweight tonne (dwt)  tanker was on its way from Japan to Jeddah with one Greek and 13 Sri Lankan crew members.

* Frigia: Seized on March 23. The 35,244-dwt Maltese-flagged ship was hijacked off the Indian coast with a crew of 21 — 19 Turks and two Ukrainians.

* Iceberg 1: Seized on March 29. Pirates boarded the roll-on roll-off vessel 10 miles outside Aden Port in the Gulf of Aden. The ship carried a crew of 24.

* Al-Barari: Seized on March 31. The small Indian trade boat was captured after it left Mogadishu port, having unloaded food and medicine there. It carried a crew of 11.

* Samho Dream: Seized on April 4. The 319,000 dwt Samho Dream was en route to the United States from Iraq when it was hijacked 970 miles east of the Somali coast. The Marshall Islands-registered ship is South Korean-owned, had a crew of five South Koreans and 19 Filipinos, and carried 2 million barrels of crude oil. On April 21, Somali pirates threatened to blow up the supertanker unless a ransom of $20 million was paid.

* Rak Afrikana: Seized on April 11. The St Vincent and Grenadines-flagged 7,561 deadweight cargo ship was hijacked about 280 nautical miles west of the Seychelles. The ship is owned by Seychelles's Rak Afrikana Shipping Ltd.

* Three Thai fishing vessels — Prantalay 11, 12 and 14 — were hijacked on April 17-18 with a total of  77 crew.

* Voc Daisy: Seized on April 21. The Panama-flagged bulk ship with its crew of 21 Filipinos was captured 190 miles southeast of the Omani port of Salalah.

* Al-Dhafir: Seized on May 7. The Yemeni fishing boat was seized off the coast of Yemen with a crew of seven fishermen.

* Marida Marguerite: Seized on May 8. The chemical tanker en route from Kandla in Gujarat to Antwerp in Belgium was hijacked some 150 miles south of Salalah off the Gulf of Aden with a 22-member crew — 19 Indians, two Bangladeshis and one Ukrainian.

* Panega: Seized on May 11. The Bulgarian-flagged ship, with 15 crew and a dwt of 5,848 tonnes, was seized about 100 miles east of the Yemeni port of Aden.

* Eleni P: Seized on May 12. The Liberia-flagged and Greek-owned ship, carrying iron and sailing from the Ukraine to China via Singapore was seized in the Gulf of Aden. Of the 24 people on board, two were Greeks and the rest Filipinos.

* Golden Blessing: Seized on June 28. The 2010-built, 14,445 dwt Singapore-registered chemical tanker was seized on its way from Saudi Arabia to India when it was boarded off East Africa. The ship had 19 Chinese sailors onboard.

* Motivator: Seized on July 4. A 13,065 dwt tanker, hijacked in the Red Sea, Motivator was manned by 18 Filipino crew and carrying lubricating oil. It flies a Marshall Islands flag.

Piracy Facts:
— The London-headquartered International Maritime Bureau said its piracy reporting centre in Kuala Lumpur logged a total of 196 pirate incidents globally from January to June 2010.

— There were 31 successful hijackings globally from the 196 incidents, and of those, 27 were off the coast of Somalia or in the Gulf of Aden.

— At least 544 crew were taken hostage in the first six months of 2010 and around 360 crew members were still being held as on June 30.

— There were 31 successful hijackings globally and 240 pirate incidents for the whole of 2009.