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France/Somalia - pirates
French fire may have killed yacht hostage, says minister
Article published on the 2009-04-11 Latest update 2009-04-11 14:12 TU
Armed pirates are seen aboard the French yacht Tanit off Somalia
(Photo: Reuters/French navy handout)
France's Defence Minister Hervé Morin says that shots fired by French soldiers may have accidentally killed the owner of a yacht which had been captured by pirates off the Somali coast.
Morin told Europe 1 radio on Saturday that it could have been a French bullet which killed Florent Lemaçon, the owner of the yacht Tanit, during a French marine commando operation to take free the boat and its crew from pirates.
Lemaçon had a son, who was among the four other hostages who were freed and are reported to be "safe and sound".
"There will be a legal enquiry and so there will be an autopsy," Morin said. "It cannot be excluded that, during the exchange of fire between pirates and commandos, the shot was French."
Two pirates were killed and three taken prisoner during the operation. Morin has defended the action as "the best possible decision". He says that a "significant" sum was offered as ransom but was turned down by the pirates, who also refused an exchange of a military officer for some of the hostages.
Morin told Europe 1 that a rescue would have been impossible if the hostages had been taken to the Somali coast and "by its very nature, there is no such thing as zero risk".
He said that ransoms were paid to free hostages from the French luxury yacht, Le Ponant, on 11 April, but not for the Carré d'As which was freed in an operation in which one pirate was killed last September.
Another group of pirates is still holding Richard Phillips, the captain of a US boat, the Maersk Alabama, which was carrying 5,000 tonnes of UN aid destined for African refugees.
Somali traditional chiefs have offered to negotiate his release 'without use of arms or ransom", according to Andrew Mwangura of the Kenya-based Seafarers' Assitance Programme.
 One killed, four freed in French rescue operation |
