Two days earlier, he and fellow sailors from Vietnam, Taiwan, Cambodia, Indonesia and China, captured in March 2012 south of the Seychelles, had been released in exchange for a ransom.  The fishermen’s release was negotiated by a former British army colonel who has made a mission of working to free ‘forgotten hostages’ 
 
 Somali pirates have released 26 Asian hostages held for nearly five years after the hijacking of their fishing vessel, the last commercial ship seized at the height of the country’s piracy scourge, negotiators said on Saturday. The crew of the Naham 3, held hostage for the second longest by Somali pirates, were taken captive when their Omani-flagged vessel was seized in March 2012 south of the Seychelles. Only a crew of Thai fishermen, released in February last year after nearly five years in captivity, spent longer held by Somali pirates. Pirates initially took 29 crew hostage, but one person died during the hijacking, and two more “succumbed to illness” during their captivity, said a statement from Oceans Beyond Piracy (OBP). Steed said negotiations – which took 18 months – involved mediation with community, tribal and religious leaders. “We are very pleased to announce the release of the Naham 3 crew early this morning,” said John Steed, coordinator of the Hostage Support Partners (HSP) who helped negotiate their release. Steed, a retired British army colonel who has made it his mission to save “forgotten hostages” told AFP the mission to return the crew to their families still had one obstacle: extracting them from the city of Galkayo, where fighting was raging between forces from the rival regional states of Puntland and Galmudug. The OBP said trawler was initially tethered to another hijacked vessel, the MV Albedo, but that both had subsequently sunk, on separate occasions. “When the MV Albedo began to sink, with its crew onboard, the crew of the Naham 3 courageously assisted in their rescue by jumping into the ocean to save the drowning seafarers. He said when the Naham 3 sank, a year after its capture, “these guys were then taken ashore where they have been ever since with pirates making increasingly irrational demands. The fact that they didn’t do that with these guys tells you that on an individual level, the circumstances were worse for each one of them.” 
 
 
 
 Piracy off Somalia’s coast was once a serious threat to the global shipping industry, but the number of attacks has declined sharply in recent years since vessels began carrying armed guards and EU naval forces increased patrols. The OBP said on Saturday: “Whilst there has not been a successful attack on a commercial vessel since 2012, there have been a number of attacks on fishing vessels and there remain a number of hostages still held in Somalia.” Among those still far from freedom are 10 Iranians and three Kenyans. According to the OBP, while overall numbers are down in the western Indian Ocean, pirates in the region in 2015 attacked at least 306 seafarers. “They have spent over four and a half years in deplorable conditions away from their families,” said Steed.
– Some 26 "forgotten hostages" held by Somali pirates for years after the piracy crisis faded from the headlines are finally free. The captives, fishermen from Vietnam, Taiwan, Cambodia, Indonesia, China, and the Philippines, were freed Saturday with the help of the Hostage Support Partners group, which negotiated with tribal and religious leaders. John Steed, a retired British colonel who works as a coordinator for the group, tells the AFP that the men are in "reasonable condition," considering that they have "spent over four and a half years in deplorable conditions away from their families." He says the men are the "last remaining seafarers taken hostage during the height of Somali piracy." Steed says one crew member died during the March 2012 hijacking of their Omani-flagged vessel and another two died during their captivity. He says the boat sank a year after its capture and the men were taken to a village in Somalia, where they were held by "pirates making increasingly irrational demands." On Sunday, the freed sailors were flown from Somalia to Kenya, where one of them told the BBC he felt like the "walking dead" after so long as a captive. He said food and water were in short supply and the men had eaten rats to survive. "Eat anything, even you not like, you feel hungry, you eat it,” he said. "You eat rat, you cook it."