KIDNAPPINGS rose by 40% in the Gulf of Guinea in the first nine months of this year, and the region of West Africa's coast now accounts for 95% of global maritime kidnappings, the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) has revealed. Eighty seafarers were taken in the Gulf of Guinea, a 2.3 million sq km (888,000 sq m) area bordering more than a dozen countries, sharply up from the same period in 2019, and the pirates are attacking further out to sea than before, the IMB said. Pirates armed with guns and knives attack everything from oil platforms to fishing vessels and…