Indian naval forces came to the rescue of a merchant vessel under attack by pirates in the Gulf of Aden on Saturday , capturing 23 of the raiders , India said .
vessel
['indian', 'naval', 'force', 'come', 'rescue', 'merchant', 'vessel', 'attack', 'pirate', 'gulf', 'aden', 'saturday', 'capture', '23', 'raider', 'india', 'say']
Indian naval forces came to the rescue of a merchant <m> vessel </m> under attack by pirates in the Gulf of Aden on Saturday , capturing 23 of the raiders , India said .
Indian naval forces came to the rescue of a merchant <m> vessel </m> under attack by pirates in the Gulf of Aden on Saturday , capturing 23 of the raiders , India said .
India 's INS Mysore and its armed helicopter were on anti-piracy patrol when they received a distress call from the Ethiopian-flagged MV Gibe saying two boats were closing in and firing , a Defence Ministry statement said .
`` On sighting the helicopter and Mysore , the boats disengaged from MV Gibe and attempted escape .
Mysore closed the vessels and ordered them to stop . ''
Indian commandos boarded the larger pirate boat , seizing 12 Somali and 11 Yemeni nationals as well as arms and equipment , the statement said .
A surge in piracy this year in the busy Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean off Somalia has driven up insurance costs , earned the gangs tens of millions of dollars in ransoms , and prompted foreign navies to rush to the area to protect shipping .
Several international naval operations are under way off Somalia , including a NATO anti-piracy mission .
The Indian Navy in November said it had sunk the Somali pirate `` mother ship '' , though an anti-piracy watchdog later said the vessel was actually a Thai ship carrying fishing equipment that was being hijacked .
Somalia has seen continuous conflict since 1991 and its weak Western-backed government is still fighting Islamist insurgents .
The chaos has helped fuel the explosion in piracy .
There have been nearly 100 attacks in Somali waters this year .
Pirates holding about a dozen ships and nearly 300 crewmen in safe havens on the Somali coast .
Among the captured vessels are a Saudi supertanker loaded with $ 100 million of crude oil , the Sirius Star , and a Ukrainian cargo ship carrying some 30 Soviet-era tanks , the MV Faina .