The Indian navy says it has captured 23 Somali and Yemeni pirates who attacked a merchant vessel in the Gulf of Aden.
  
The navy said in a statement on Saturday that an Indian navy ship sent its marine commandos on a helicopter towards the Ethiopian flag-bearing vessel MV Gibe after getting a distress call that it was under fire from two boats.

The boats tried to escape on seeing the navy ship but were chased and the pirates surrendered to the commandos when they  boarded the boats.
  
"Twenty-three personnel (12 Somali and 11 Yemeni) surrendered on boarding," the navy said.

'Mother vessel'

The pirates, along with their arms and equipment, would be handed over to the appropriate authorities, it said, adding that the ship would return to patrolling the Gulf of Aden.
  
Last month, the navy said it had sunk a pirate "mother vessel" off Somalia in a battle that started after the Indian ship INS Tabar came under attack from armed men on board the boat.
  
But the International Maritime Bureau later said that the vessel destroyed by the Indian navy was actually a Thai fishing trawler that had been seized by pirates off the coast of Yemen.
  
Somali pirates have carried out about 100 attacks in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean since the start of this year.

They still hold at least 14 foreign vessels and more than 300 crew members to ransom.