COPENHAGEN, October 27, 2010 (AFP) - A Danish warship intercepted and then sank a suspected pirate boat in the Gulf of Aden after confiscating a large quantity of fuel and weapons, the Danish navy said Wednesday.

The crew of the Esbern Snare "approached a suspect pirate boat off the coast of Somalia Tuesday and seized a large number of cans of petrol and weapons, and detained the six suspected Somali pirates on board," Kenneth Nielsen, a spokesman for the navy's operational command, told AFP.

The boat was then mined and sunk by the explosives, he added.

The navy described the vessel as a pirate "mother-ship" which carries the speed boats that pirates use to attack other ships.

The Danes took the six suspected pirates to the Somali coast and released them, the spokesman said.

"We could not arrest them because they had not by law committed a criminal act," he explained.

The Esbern Snare, a command and control vessel, is taking part in NATO's anti-piracy operation in the Gulf of Aden, dubbed "Ocean Shield", which started in August 2009 and has been extended until the end of 2012.

A record number of more than 200 acts of piracy have been recorded in the region since 2009, with an estimated 50 million dollars in ransom paid to the pirates.