DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES (AP) – Armed private guards aboard a famous yacht once owned by the late Welsh actor Richard Burton fired on approaching ships on Friday in the Gulf of Aden, off the coast of Yemen, in an intense gunfight.
The authorities said the guards mistakenly opened fire on Yemeni Coast Guard members but the ship’s manager insisted they shot at pirates.
The shooting reportedly killed one Yemeni Coast Guard member and wounded another person in a hail of gunfire the guards are said to have shot as many as 200 rounds of ammunition. It shows the danger faced by both shippers and security forces in the waters off the Arab world’s poorest country, even as it remains crucial for global commerce.
Details of what happened to the Kalizma remain unclear and contested, hours after the incident.
The British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations initially reported it as an attack with gunfire off Nishtun, in Yemen’s far east near the border with Oman.
But by Friday afternoon, the British military operation providing support to ships across the Mideast described the attack in the Gulf of Aden as being “confirmed by authorities as government agency activity”, without elaborating.
Ambrey, a maritime intelligence company, said in a brief that a Yemeni Coast Guard contingent had approached a Cook Islands-flagged yacht which hadn’t responded to radio calls.
According to the Coast Guard, “an armed security team onboard the yacht then opened fire on the approaching Yemenis and attempted to escape perceived pirates”, Ambrey said.
The Coast Guard “returned fire and followed the yacht for approximately an hour until communications with the yacht could be established and the misunderstanding between the parties resolved”.
Ambrey said one Yemeni Coast Guard member was killed. A later statement from the Yemeni Coast Guard, posted online, acknowledged the death and said its forces along with Yemen’s navy tried to stop the Kalizma as it was operating in a “very suspicious way” close to the shore and did not answer radio calls.