Italian commandos storm Turkish ship to thwart migrant hijackers

Heavily armed commandos boarded the ship from helicopters. Photo: IMPA

Italian special forces stormed a cargo ship after 15 “illegal migrants”. armed with knives tried to seize the ship and take its crew hostage.

The raid footage shows how heavily armed commandos are dropped onto the ship from helicopters, and then move across the deck with their guns raised.

“The stowaways used what appeared to be dagger-like weapons” to threaten the crew, said Guido Crosetto, Italy's defense minister.

The armed gang was mostly from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, according to The Guardian. . According to Mr. Crosetto, they were illegal migrants.

13 men and two women boarded a Galatea Seaways vessel in an attempt to reach Europe. The ship left Sète in France on June 7 for Yalova in Turkey.

The commandos moved across the ship with their guns raised. Photo: Shutterstock

The crew of the ship spotted the gang late Friday morning with CCTV cameras that showed them roaming the boat.

The captain told the Italian police that he sounded the alarm after seeing two of them with knives.

The crew locked themselves in the engine room and alerted the Turkish maritime authorities, who in turn contacted Italy and France.< /p>

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“Everything ended well,” Mr. Crosetto tweeted.

“Congratulations to the guys from the San Marco Battalion and the police for a wonderful operation” , he wrote.The Italian commandos managed to defeat the migrant hijackers. Photo: Shutterstock

Ansa news agency reported that the prosecutor's office ordered the police to check into what happened and that the migrants were disembarked. The ship was to continue its journey from the southern city of Naples.

The incident follows growing discontent in Turkey over migration. The country became home to one of the world's largest migrant populations when it struck a deal with Brussels to help resolve the 2015-2016 European refugee crisis.

But economic instability exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic has fueled public fear. migrants to levels that were rarely recorded before.

In recent years, this fear has turned into hostility and led to growing support for their departure.

In the last elections in Turkey, anti-migrant rhetoric became a feature of the election campaign Campaign: Opposition candidate Kemal Kilicdaroglu accused President Erdogan of being too soft on migrants.