Wives of Russian fishermen who had been held to ransom by Somalia pirates since October last year held an unauthorized protest meeting in Kaliningrad, Regnum agency reports. The women and friends of Russian crew members of a Thai Unio-3 tuna boat gathered on the square Vasilevsky to tell reporters about the release situation.

According to the protesters, the authorities of the West Marine Agency Fleet-Personnel had told them of successful the negotiations, ransom to be paid before late 2009. "They had promised us that our people would be home again on the New Year's holidays, but something went wrong, everything stopped. It’s been almost a month since the pirates cut any contacts", Tamara Gerasimova, wife of the boat senior master Leonid Gerasimov was quoted as saying.

As earlier reports said, the Somalia pirates seized the ship on October 29, 2009 in the Indian Ocean. Of the 27 crew on board, 23 were Russian citizens, all from the Kaliningrad region.