By Daniel Wallis

NAIROBI, 26 Feb. 2007 - A U.S. warship is approaching the area off the Horn of Africa where Somali pirates have anchored a hijacked ship chartered to carry U.N. food aid, a U.N. spokeswoman said on Monday.

Gunmen wielding AK-47s stormed the Kenyan-owned MV Rozen on Sunday, taking hostage its six Kenyan and six Sri Lankan crew after intercepting the freighter by speedboat.

It was the third hijacking in two years of a ship hired to carry relief supplies by the U.N.'s World Food Programme (WFP

Penny Ferguson, WFP spokeswoman in neighboring Kenya, said the United Nations understood the vessel was anchored off Bargal, a port in Somalia's semi-autonomous Puntland region.

"We also understand a U.S. warship is heading to that area but that it is still in international waters," Ferguson said. "There has been no contact yet from the pirates and our biggest concern remains for the safety of the crew."

The ship, chartered by WFP from Mombasa-based Motaku Shipping Agency, was seized after unloading 1,800 metric tonnes of food aid at two northern Somali ports.

Somali pirates seized three Motaku vessels in 2005, holding one and its crew hostage for nearly 100 days. Two of those ships had been carrying WFP cargoes.

A Motaku director confirmed there had been no word yet from the hijackers, and said the company was waiting for any news.

WFP said the Rozen was attacked last year off Marka, a port south of Mogadishu, but dodged the pirates that time.

Pirates had vanished from Somali waters while a battle for control of the nation raged on land. Sunday's hijacking was the first reported since the interim government and its Ethiopian allies routed Islamists from Mogadishu in January.

Experts say a band of pirates based in Harardheere port have regrouped and are thought to have been behind Sunday's attack and two unsuccessful hijacking attempts earlier this year.

The Islamists, who ruled much of southern Somalia for six months through strict sharia law, had cracked down on piracy, in part to protect their weapons shipments.

The pirates, often in the pay of warlords on land, had made Somalia's coastline one of the most dangerous in the world. In October, Kenya jailed ten Somali pirates for seven years after they were detained by the U.S. Navy off the Somali coast.

(Additional reporting by Wangui Kanina)

Source: Reuters