MV Hansa Stavanger

MV Hansa Stavanger was a German container ship. The owner of the ship was Schiffahrts-Gesellschaft MS "HANSA STAVANGER" Co. KG. The Hansa Stavanger was built in 1997 at Guangzhou Wenchong Shipyard in the Chinese city of Guangzhou. Her loading capacity is 20,526 GT & she could transport 1,550 containers on board. She was captured by Somali pirates on 4 April 2009. Around 1 May 2009, USS Boxer (LHD-4) and a screen of German Navy warships assisted approximately 200 members of the German special police unit GSG-9 in approaching the hijacked ship. During the last phase of the operation, James L. Jones, the U.S. President's National Security Advisor, withheld final approval for the operation out of concern for the safety of the 25 sailors aboard the vessel. This led the German Federal Ministry of Defence to abort the planned attack on the freighter and the GSG-9 unit returned to their base of operations at the airport of Mombasa, Kenya.

Among the captured sailors held hostage were eleven Tuvaluans and one Fijian. A ransom of US$15 million had been demanded. The government of Tuvalu indicated it was incapable of paying, and expressed great concern for its citizens. On 3 August 2009 the ship was released after a ransom of US$2 million dollars was paid, and was escorted into port in Mombasa, Kenya by the German frigates GERMAN FRIGATE Brandenburg and GERMAN FRIGATE Rheinland-Pfalz.

Whereabouts of the ship
After hijacking, the vessel was later renamed to Pearl, reflagged from Liberia to Comoros & in January 2013 renamed again to VSM & beached at Alang, India on 13 February 2013.