The sixteen Bulgarian sailors who have been kidnapped by Somali pirates are going to be released very soon.

This expectation was expressed Thursday by Tzvetan Gadev, the Bulgarian representative of the Italian firm operating the UK-owned Malaspina Castle cargo ship.

Gadev told the Bulgarian National Radio that the negotiations for paying the ransom, whose amount has not been specified, and for the release of the kidnapped sailors have really made substantial progress.

The Bulgarian Deputy Foreign Minister, Milen Keremedchiev, who is officially in charge of handling the negotiations on part of the Bulgarian state, has confirmed that no ransom has been paid yet.

Malaspina Castle was hijacked on April 6, 2009, in the Gulf of Aden. It is UK-owned under Panamanian flag. 16 of its 24-member crew are Bulgarians, and the rest include Russians, Ukrainians, and Filipinos.

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