BRITISH COUPLE TAKEN BY PIRATES

Emergency search teams have been launched following the disappearance of a British couple thought to have been abducted by pirates off the east coast of Africa. Paul and Rachel Chandler of Tunbridge Wells in Kent were sailing from the Seychelles to Tanzania last Friday when a distress signal was received from their yacht the Lynn Rival.
A news agency has since been contacted by a pirate named Hassan who said that the couple were in their hands now and were healthy and to expect demands for a ransom. The Foreign Office is investigating the reports.
According to a statement made by a British coastguard: 'They had left the Seychelles on October 22 and were going on a 150 nautical-mile passage south-west to the Amirante Islands, en route to Tanzania. It would appear from the activation of the EPIRB that something has happened... We were aware that the EPIRB had gone off, talked to the Seychelles, asked if they were aware of it, they were, and have been searching, by air and sea.'
It is thought that there had been pirate activity around the area where Mr and Mrs Chandler (aged 58 and 55) went missing.

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