Somali pirates struck again yesterday, seizing an Iranian cargo ship holding 30,000 tonnes of grain, as the world’s governments and navies pronounced themselves powerless against this new threat to global trade. Admiral Michael Mullen, the US military chief, pronounced himself stunned by the pirates’ reach after their capture of the supertanker Sirius Star and its $100 million (£70 million) cargo. Commanders from the US Fifth Fleet and from Nato warships in the area said that they would not intervene to retake the vessel. The Foreign Minister of Saudi Arabia, the owner of the ship, condemned the hijacking as an ‘outrageous act’ that required international action. ‘Piracy, like terrorism, is a disease which is against everybody, and everybody must address it together,’ Prince Saud al-Faisal said. Arab diplomats would meet in Cairo on Thursday to discuss what could be done in response, Yemeni officials said. Analysts said, however, that the seizure of the Sirius Star exposed the use of foreign warships as ‘a sticking plaster’ that would not solve the problem. ‘Maritime security operations in that area are addressing the symptoms not the causes,’ said Jason Alderwick, a maritime defence analyst at the International Institute for Strategic […]