Egypt welcomes men who outfoxed pirates

Family, friends, well-wishers and officials were on hand to greet the 34 men on their return after their two fishing vessels, the Momtaz 1 and Samara Ahmed, were hijacked in April.

The men overpowered their armed captors on Aug. 13 and sailed in the two vessels, bringing eight pirates with them. At least seven dead pirates were found in the sea by their colleagues afterward, an associate of the pirates has said.

Egyptian security met the returning vessels at sea and took the eight captive pirates to an undisclosed location for questioning.

Wearing brand new tracksuits, the nearly three dozen fishermen disembarked in the port city of Suez into the waiting arms of hundreds of relatives and friends, as traditional Egyptian drummers and dancers performed in the background. One mother fainted from the joy of seeing her son return.

The fishermen spoke freely of how harrowing the experience had been, but were cagey about exactly how they managed to overpower their captors and seize eight of them.

When pressed on how they managed to escape, Sobhi he said they were aided by Somali gunmen who boarded the ship and helped attack the pirates - corroborating the version of events provided by the owner of one of the boats, Mohammad Nasr, who said the owner of the second vessel, Hassan Khalil, hired the Somalis; Kazinform cites Arab News. See www.arabnews.com for full version.