They're taking our phones away, pray for me: Chief officer of ship under pirate attack

"They're taking our phones away…Pray for me. They're taking our phones," said Md Atik Ullah Khan in his last voice message to his family.

Md Atik Ullah Khan is the chief officer of the Bangladeshi ship MV Abdullah which has been held hostage by Somali pirates in the Indian Ocean since Monday (11 March) morning.

Atik's mother, Shahnur Begum, said the pirates are demanding a ransom of $5 million.

Atik is the sole bread winner of the family consisting of his mother, brother, wife and three daughters.

His wife is pregnant with their fourth child.

He worked in SR Shipping from 2013-2020. He got on board this trip three months ago on 25 November.

"They will kill us one by one if they do not get ransom," These were the chilling words of a worker Uddin Mohammad Nur, onboard the ship.

Nur sent the message to his wife, who then sent it to relevant officials yesterday (12 March).

The message was received by Meena Azmin as well, the wife of Atik, the chief officer of the Bangladeshi ship MV Abdullah, which has been seized by Somali pirates in the Indian Ocean since Monday (11 March) morning.

The sender of the voice message was first wrongly identified as Md Atik Ullah Khan.

In the message Nur said, "Pass this message to everyone: they are taking away our phones. Final word is that if the ransom is not paid, they said they will kill us one by one. The sooner they are paid the ransom, the sooner they would let us go."

In another audio message to the owner of the vessel, KSRM Group, a crew member said, "50 pirates have taken station above the ship. They haven't harmed us yet, but are trying to scare us in various ways.

"We have food supplies for 20-25 days, along with 200 tonnes of fresh water and 55,000 tonnes of coal. To ensure our logistics last, everyone has been instructed not to use them unnecessarily."

Another crew member deck cadet Sabbir Hossain sent a WhatsApp message around 1:40pm saying, "Please save us. Somalian pirates have taken our ship hostage, they have heavy weapons."

The crew on the ship could not be contacted after 6pm yesterday.

The Bangladeshi-flagged ocean-going vessel named MV ABDULLAH, which was going to Dubai from Mozambique, carrying 23 crew members.

The vessel is owned by SR Shipping, a Chattogram-based company owned by KSRM Group. 

Meanwhile, authorities concerned said it might take days before an operation can be launched to rescue the hijacked ship and its crew.

Shahriar Jahan Rahat, deputy managing director of KSRM Group, told The Business Standard that the company will give the utmost importance in rescuing the 23 crew members on board when the communication process starts.