State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said, “we welcome the release of the two US citizens who were kidnapped from the Retriever. For privacy reasons, we will not provide any additional information on the two individuals or the circumstances of their release,” she added.
Pirates stormed an oil supply vessel off southern Nigeria and kidnapped two American crew members, Nigeria’s navy and US defense officials said last month.
A news agency report had quoted Nigeria’s Navy Spokesman Kabir Aliyu as saying that “in the latest unrest in a region described as a piracy hotspot, a US-flagged C-Retriever owned by American oil servicing company Edison Chouest Offshore was attacked off the city of Brass.
The ship’s chief engineer and captain, both American citizens, were kidnapped in the attack, said US defense officials who requested anonymity, and AKE, a private security firm which closely tracks the region.
