On Januare 6th, 2012 Michael Scott Moore, an American surf journalist and progressive writer was kidnapped by Somali pirates.
He was there researching a book on Somali pirates.
From The Inertia
two weeks into Moore’s trip, he was scheduled to take a flight to Nairobi via Mogadishu when en route to the airport he was kidnapped in Galkayo by 15 men in two SUVs who were government-provided security guards that secretly conspired with pirates to take Moore hostage.
Two days after Moore was kidnapped, Somali leader Mohamed Ahmed Alim tried to negotiate with the captives but they would not discuss his release until a ransom was paid. Moore is currently being held for ransom for 20 million dollars to be paid by American or German governments. Moore is also amongst two other captives Songorrie Marc and Rolly Tambara and the crew of the ship Aride, which was hijacked off the Seychelles.
On January 25th 2012 one week after Michael was kidnapped, U.S. Special Operations troops in nearby Camp Lemonnier locked down the town of Galkayo after planning a rescue mission weeks in advance for two DDG workers that were previously kidnapped in the same region under similar fashion.
Then SEAL Team 6 went in to try to rescue him
U.S. Navy Seal Team 6 gathered Intel using phone intercepts, surveillance and visual confirmation and High Altitude Low Opening (HALO) jumps from the sky which silently executed all nine kidnappers. Just so there were no surprises each armed kidnapper either sleeping or awake was killed using double tap shooting techniques which is when two well-aimed shots are fired at a single target with very little time in between, the latter being the kill shot. These highly trained tactics helped in the 3:30am blacked out rescue mission and resulted in the successful rescue of American Jessica Buchanan age 32 and Danish citizen Dane Poul Thisted age 60 of the Danish Demining Group (DDG). The two hostages were lifted back onto a nearby waiting helicopter. There was not enough time to locate or include Moore in the tightly coordinated and timed rescue mission. Rescuers knew that the fate of Moore would be adversely affected by the successful rescue attempt of the two hostages. U.S. Navy SEAL Team 6 is the same SEAL squad that killed Osama bin Laden.
And now he is just still there...
What can we do on our end to push for more activity from Secretary of State et al?