Regional anti-piracy center to be opened soon in Yemen

SANA'A- Mar 7, 2011- Minister of Transport Khalid al-Wazir discussed here on Sunday with representative of the General Secretary of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) the final procedures to officially inaugurate the Regional Center for Coordinating and Exchanging Information to Combat Sea Piracy and Armed Robbery to be headquartered in Sana'a to take place end of March 2011.

During the meeting, the minister affirmed that the Yemeni leadership, represented by President Ali Abdullah Saleh, is keen since sea piracy emerged, to find out active and urgent solutions to solve sea piracy in cooperation with the region countries and IMO, in addition to the international community.

He pointed out steps and procedures taken to implement commitment of Yemen in the Code of Conduct between the Indian Ocean western countries and the Gulf of Aden over combating sea piracy and armed robbery against ships, specially with respect to establishing this center which started its real work beginning of last February.

He praised support of the government of Japan, the European Union and IMO for establishing and equipping this regional center.

For his part, the IMO official expressed satisfaction for the prompt procedures taken by the Yemeni government to achieve this center with the aim of reinforcing the regional cooperation to combat sea piracy and armed robbery.

Source: (Saba)