Arms-laden US ship detained in Tuticorin: All you need to know

When and why was the ship detained?  The ship was detained on 12 October by the Coast Guard after information was received that weapons were being ferried illegally by the ship. An FIR has been registered against 10 crew members and 25 guards of the MV Seaman Guard Ohio ship under the Arms Act for illegally carrying arms and ammunition, police said. A case under the Essential Commodities Act has also been registered for buying 1,500 litres of diesel illegally with the help of a local shipping agent. According to India Today, preliminary investigations revealed that the ship was between Tuticorin port and Kudankulam nuclear power plant for 30 days and the Director General for shipping is to submit a report to the admiralty court. [caption id=“attachment_1173151” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  The ship is presently in the Tuticorin port. PTI[/caption] Who are the crew and what has been recovered? The 10 crew members   reportedly consists of two Ukranian and eight Indian nationals. Of the 25 security guards on board six are British, 14 are Estonian, four are Indians and one of them is Ukranian. The four Indian security guards are ex- Indian Army and Navy personnel. What have the authorities recovered from the ship? The police has seized 31 assault rifles and around 5,000 rounds of ammunition from the ship. What do we know about the ship Coast guard official Santosh Kumar Singh was quoted as telling the Associated Press that the ship is owned by a Virginia-based security company, AdvanFort, but is registered in Sierra Leone. The ship’s captain has reportedly told investigators that AdvanFort provides armed escorts to merchant vessels traveling in pirate-infested waters in the Indian Ocean. AdvanFort has not commented on the issue so far but its official site says that the Washington-headquartered firm it specialises in maritime security. “AdvanFort’s executive, management and operational teams consist of highly experienced former US and UK military special operators and intelligence community veterans as well as former NATO security professionals,” the firm’s site says. India’s Deputy National Security Advisor has said that the ship may have been a mother ship for security operations in the Gulf of Aden. “You have had piracy earlier in the Strait of Malacca and now in the Gulf. People who provide such security need a floating armoury. My suspicion is that the boat in Tuticorin is a floating armoury for one of these private security agencies,” Deputy National Security Adviser Nehchal Sandhu today said. Sandhu, a former chief of Intelligence Bureau, said piracy has increased in international waters and civil maritime operations have employed private maritime security companies against pirates. Why was the FIR filed against the ship’s crew? Coast Guard officials told the Associated Press that the ship’s crew had said that the documents for the weapons on board the vessel were with the company. However, after they failed to produce the documents over two days, the FIR was registered against them. According to an NDTV report, the ship had berthed at the Kochi port in the last week of August at which time it did not have any of the weapons. with inputs from PTI