In the latest incident, Somali pirates have hijacked a Belize-registered Ukrainian freighter, the MV Faina, bound for Mombasa with a cargo of rocket-propelled grenades, machine-guns and 33 Russian T-72 tanks, which in reality may have been illegally destined for southern Sudan. The Kenyan official who alerted the world to this hijacking is now in jail. While the tanks will not be easily offloaded, the small arms are being taken ashore by relays of small boats, with 5 per cent being hived off by al-Shabaab as its share of the loot. The fate of the 20-man crew is uncertain; the captain is said to have died, apparently of hypertension, after the initial assault. As I write, Nato ships are now within a 10-mile radius of the freighter, with a Russian frigate about to join them. According to a pirate spokesman, communicating with journalists via a satellite phone, the more radical pirates have vowed to fight to the death - their own and the hostages'. Russia's record in hostage rescue is not a happy one.

This story warrants the skills of a modern-day Joseph Conrad. Some 230 merchant mariners are currently being held hostage in Somalia, by pirates operating in and around the Gulf of Aden. This year, they have hijacked 30 vessels and currently hold 10. They range from luxury yachts and ocean-going tugs to tankers laden with palm oil or petrochemicals, like the Malaysian-registered Bunga Melati Dua and Bunga Melati Lim, which were seized in September along with 69 crew. A $4 million ransom appears to have been paid to release these two ships.

Britons have been affected too, notably 70-year-old sea captain Colin Darch, on his final voyage taking a Danish-built tug from St Petersburg to Singapore. He who was held for more than 40 days by Somali pirates until the Danish owners reputedly coughed up a $700,000 ransom. There were long delays in finalising this transaction since the pirates had neither passports nor bank accounts, and fake $100 bills were mixed in. As Darch noted, "It was like a syndicate of factory workers who had won the lottery but couldn't find the ticket."