Hillary On Pirate Hostage Crisis
By SusanUnPC on April 9, 2009 at 12:25 PM in Piracy, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Somalia
UPDATES: (SEE the latest Fox Video below on “Navy security team” aboard the U.S. vessel.) Also: Megyn Kelly calls Capt. Richard Phillips the “Sully of the Oceans.” (“Sully” is the pilot who landed a US Airways jetliner in the Hudson River without loss of life. Kelly co-anchors Fox News’s “America’s Newsroom.”)
Today: “Pirates still hold ship captain, but running out of fuel (Roundup),” Africa News:
We are watching this very closely,’ US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in brief remarks in Washington. The lifeboat in which the captain was being held had apparently run out of fuel, she added.
Secretary Clinton was asked about the pirate takeover Wednesday during her meeting Moroccan Foreign Minister Dr. Taieb Fassi Fihri, during which she took the opportunity to mention that Morocco was the first nation to recognize the U.S.A. in the 18th century and helped our fledgling nation fight piracy long ago. (Special request to our Reader Historians: Please share those great stories!):
From the text of the press conference:
[...]
QUESTION: Madame Secretary, do you have any clarity on the Somali piracy situation?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, we’re deeply concerned and we’re following it very closely. Specifically, we are now focused on this particular act of piracy and the seizure of a ship that carries 21 American citizens. More generally, we think the world must come together to end the scourge of piracy.
I think Morocco was the very first country that recognized us, going back a long time. And we worked together to end piracy off of the coast of Morocco all those years ago, and we’re going to work together to end this kind of criminal activity anywhere on the high seas. Thank you.
UPDATE FROM FOX NEWS / TIME-SENSITIVE:
Earlier, here’s a short Reuters video report that sums up the crisis:






















