Canada will extend by a month the mission of one of its warships to escort civilian ships delivering humanitarian aid to Somalia, announced the Ministry of Defense on Thursday.
The mission extension until October 23 for the "Ville de Quebec" frigate was decided after a request from the World Food Program (WFP), the ministry said in a statement.
Since 2007, warships from NATO countries have escorted WFP shipments to Somalia to ensure safe passage through waters that have become notorious for piracy.
The Gulf of Aden, off the Somali coastline, is a certified hotspot for pirates — more than 50 attacks on ships in the area have been recorded so far this year, up from 13 attacks in 2007.
Since August the Ville de Quebec has been assigned to escort civilian vessels carrying food aid from Mombasa, Kenya to Mogadishu, Somalia.
The WFP shipments are intended to meet the urgent needs of more than 2.4 million Somalis who rely on food aid, of which 90 percent arrives by sea.
So far, 22,000 tonnes (22,000,000 kilos) of corn and soy meal — enough to feed 145,125 people for a year — have been delivered to Somalia by ships escorted by the Ville de Quebec.
