The Kenyan authorities have agreed to prosecute four of the remaining Somali pirates on board the Danish warship Absalon, which rescued 14 Pakistanis and Iranians who had been held hostage by pirates since November.

Seventeen other pirates who were being held on the Absalon have been released.

“I am satisfied that another four pirates will now be prosecuted. With the four we have previously handed over of the Seychelles, we have organised prosecution for the hard core of suspects – those who took part in the original hijacking of the Iranian vessel,” says Foreign Minister Villy Søvndal.

Søvndal says that the number of hijackings off the Horn of Africa has fallen ‘dramatically’ and more and more pirates are being prosecuted.

“This is the second time that Kenya has agreed to receive pirates that Denmark has detained. I am most grateful. We have been working on this for some time, and even though the action itself was a success, prosecution is the jewel in the crown,” Søvndal says.

25 Somali pirates were detained on January 7th, when the Absalon exchanged fire and boarded an Iranian trawler on which 14 Pakistani and Iranian hostages had been held since November 2011. Four of the pirates are to be prosecuted by Seychelles authorities, which initially had said they would not receive any pirates. Some 15 per cent of inmates in Seychelles’ prisons are Somali pirates.

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