Shipping firm paid for negotiator to free crew kidnapped by pirates

The president of a shipping company that recently had three crewmembers kidnapped by pirates in the Malacca Strait has said that his firm paid for a negotiator to rescue the three men. Kanji Kondo, president of Kondo Kaiji in Kitakyushu that owns the tugboat Idaten, talked with the Mainichi on Wednesday and said he hired a negotiator in Malaysia to talk with the pirates after the abduction on March 14 Japanese time.