The pirate ship sunken las week by the Indian navy was in fact a Thai fishing vessel that had been seized by the pirates a few hours earlier. The Indian navy officials defended the actions of one of thier ships which sunk the pirates, claiming that it acted in self defense.

The fishing vessel, Ekawat Nava 5, had been seized by pirates on 18 November according to a report from the International Maritime Bureau. The crew of the ship was tied up and only one of them was found alive after six days adrift. The other 14 crew members are still missing.

When the two ships encountered eachother, the one belonging to the Indian navy asked the crew to stop for investigations, but the pirates refused and threatened to blow them up. The pirates could be seen roaming on the deck with rocket-propelled grenadelaunchers and opened fire first from aboard the Ekawat Nava 5. The Indian navy ship, INS Tabar, fired back and sunk the vessel in the Gulf of Aden.

"Based on reports from the crew survivor, the owner and other sources, we confirmed that the ship was most likely to be the Thai ship of the Ekwat Nava 5," said Neol Choong, director of the IBM Piracy Report Center based here.

The Somali pirates have seized almost 40 ships this year in the Gulf of Aden, one of the world's busiest shipping lanes. The biggest ship the pirates managed to get their hands on is the Saudi oil tanker, Sirius Star. The tanker is still being held off the Somali coast.