Gunpoint talks and diplomacy to rescue Red Sea hostages from Houthis

Negotiator who worked to free hostages from Somali pirates says dealing with the Houthis could be more difficult

The moment Houthi rebels swooped down on the Galaxy Leader in the Red Sea. Getty Images

When John Steed hears about a vessel being captured in the Red Sea, a well-worn mental checklist kicks in. Core to the list is: “What's the solution?”

His days negotiating the release of ship's crews held by Somali pirates are behind him now but when the vessel Galaxy Leader was seized by the Houthis, accompanied by a video of their forces swooping on to its deck, he says it was the question he asked himself “straight away”.

The job of leading diplomatic efforts to free the crew centre around the International Maritime Organisation and its secretary general Arsenio Dominguez, who has been criss-crossing the region seeking assistance.

Mr Steed, 68, a "mostly retired" former British Army officer, believes dealing with the Houthis may be more difficult than his challenge in Somalia: “There's a difference between negotiating with criminals, which the pirates are, and state actors or terrorist organisations. Those are all quite different styles and types of negotiation.

“It is very perverse because they [pirates] want something, and in most cases, you're able to give it. What the Houthis want is political, so very difficult to resolve.”

Seizure

The Galaxy Leader was boarded by the Houthis on November 19, 2023, while sailing through the Red Sea on its way from Turkey to India. After the vessel was towed to the port of Hodeidah it was turned into a tourist attraction, with Yemenis taking selfies on board.

The ship was seized ostensibly in retaliation for Israel's military action against Hamas in Gaza. The Galaxy Leader is operated by the Japanese company NYK line but belongs to Ray Car Carriers, registered in Britain's Isle of Man but owned by Israeli billionaire shipping mogul Abraham “Rami” Ungar.

The crew of the car carrier is made up of 17 Filipinos, three Ukrainians, two Bulgarians, two Mexicans and a Romanian, but none are Israeli. Several of the Filipino crewmembers are said to be having significant health problems, thought to be malaria.

So far the Houthis have not issued any specific demands for the release of the Galaxy Leader. They have only said they will not stop attacking Red Sea shipping until Israel stops its operations in Gaza.

Mr Dominguez has said he is unable to get direct access to the crew in Yemen due to the conflict there and the lack of adequate transport links.

Speaking at a recent meeting of the UN body in London, he said he had spoken to the Houthi's main backers, Iran. He said he recognised they were separate entities, making separate decisions, but he appealed for further assistance that could "provide me with the release of the Galaxy Leader crew", he said.

Mr Dominguez said he is keen for a diplomatic solution and will “continue to have those conversations and keep pushing for results” and to keep the world's attention on the Red Sea. He does not want the situation "to become the new normal" and lose media prominence, he said.

The IMO does not deal directly with the Houthis, who were re-designated as a global terrorist organisation by the US this year.

Instead, Mr Dominguez in October visited the internationally recognised government of Yemen as well as Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Oman and Djibouti in October to discuss the crisis in the Red Sea and the Galaxy leader. He also visited Iran at the end of November when he met its deputy foreign minister for political affairs, Majid Takht Ravanchi.

What do Houthis want?

Mr Steed says securing the crew's release will not be a quick or easy process. “What is it the people holding a hostage want? If it’s money, you know that what the hostages are there for. If there are political hostages, that's quite a different thing. Getting solutions for political hostages is very difficult and a very long, drawn-out thing.”

Based on his experience of those held by Somali pirates, Mr Steed believes the Galaxy Leader crew could suffer long-term damage from being detained. Much will depend on whether they are still being held on the ship and how much information they have been given.

“When they're on the ship they’re in familiar surroundings; doing things that they know, keeping the ship, working on its mechanics," he said.

"But if they've been removed and they're being held somewhere else, in a prison or in a hut in the middle of the desert, as the pirates did, you know that's quite different. The ability to have a routine [is] gone.”

If the crew are “reasonably well looked after” then they will have an “ability to survive”, said Mr Steed. “But being away from your family, the things that you do day to day, is quite traumatic no matter what the circumstances are.”

There is no evidence to suggest the Houthis have treated the crew of the Galaxy Leader to the type of punishments and torture that Mr Steed encountered when dealing with Somali pirates.

The former colonel in the British Army’s Royal Corps of Signals was posted to Kenya before working for the UN, where he ran a unit in Somalia to deal with piracy.

His job included development work in coastal villages to deal with the root causes of piracy and building prisons to hold the pirates. But he soon learnt about the plight of seafarers who were “rotting” in captivity after being abandoned by the owners of their ships.

Mr Steed had no experience of hostage negotiation but began to work out a way of finding funds to be able to pay the criminals some sort of ransom. His work secured the release of 191 hostages.

“Most ships were insured so their insurance companies would employ a negotiator. They would come to a deal with the pirates, pay the ransom and the ship would get released. They were paying quite big ransoms.

“But there was a small group of owners who didn't insure their ships. They just abandoned them and the crew to their to their fate.

“There were quite a large number of crews, mostly from Asia, who were just left in the hands of frustrated Somali pirates who didn't really understand why they couldn't extract the same millions of dollars, so they just sat there and rotted. I decided that I would try and do something about this.”

He describes conducting negotiations with a “translator”, whose role was not restricted to using their language skills.

“The translator guy would be involved, because he could talk English, so the torture of the crew would happen while he was talking to them,” he explained. “They often were involved in torture and beating the hostages while the negotiations were going on to scare families.”

One ship’s captain was dangled over the side of a ship and nearly drowned while other sailors had their ears cut off in a bid to pressure their families into finding the ransom money.

Mr Steed sought out charities and philanthropists, including in the shipping industry, who would contribute money towards ransom payments. A team of lawyers worked pro bono to help him, and they brought in a professional hostage negotiator.

The stakes were high and several sailors, including a captain, were murdered by pirates under pressure to repay the money given to them by their financial backers.

“Investors put money up to hire these guys to go to sea. They paid for the weapons and the ammunition and the boat, and they expected a return for their money. They wanted a result, and for the money they invested.

“So trying to persuade them out of that was quite difficult, but in the end, that was how we started to get results.”

His persistence began to pay off and the pirates realised it was better to get something, if not the millions of dollars they were initially asking for, and they could move on to trying to capture another ship and its crew. With negotiations stretching over months, the cost of holding the hostages began to eat into their profits.

“They realised, eventually, that we didn’t have very much money,” Mr Steed said. “They've got the best possible deal that they can and they're not going to get any more.”

Once a deal was struck, he said he ensured there was a proper handing-over ceremony during which the pirates would sign a document releasing the hostages to assure them they really were being released.

“This sounds very odd coming after a successful negotiation but we asked the pirates to sign a contract which didn't have any legal bearing whatsoever," Mr Steed said. "But it was a message that bound the pirates to the deal with us and we would make the hostages witness so that they knew a deal had been done and they knew they were on the way home.”

While the hostages were free, what they experienced often lived with them for the rest of their lives. Some even go back to sea, sailing on the same route where they were captured, to make the only living they know.

"I stayed in touch with a few of them, and you know the experience is over for them, but never goes away. It's always there in the back of their minds."