A French naval ship has begun escort duties in troubled Indian Ocean waters off the Somali coast that are prone to piracy attacks.

The UN Security Council has cleared the way for the European Union anti-piracy mission after it renewed its authorisation for use of military force against pirates of Somalia.

The detachment of French navy escorted a ship carrying food aid to Somalia as part of an agreed European Union anti-piracy naval operation off the coast of Somalia. The MV Semlow is carrying food for the UN's World Food Programme to Somalia where fighting has uprooted some one million people and more than a third of the population need emergency aid. [Passage omitted: captain of the ship.]

A surge in piracy in one the busiest shipping lanes off Somalia has pushed up insurance costs, brought pirate gangs tens of millions of dollars in ransoms and prompted foreign navies to rush to the area to protect merchant shipping. The mission [of the] first such naval operation mounted by the 27-member EU will initially involve three warships from Greece, Britain and France.

There are already several international naval operations in the area including a NATO mission to counter piracy but they have done little to deter the pirates.

They have been around 95 pirate attacks in Somalia waters this year with some 40 ships taken, including a Saudi tank holding 100m dollars [worth] of oil.