Hamburg/Berlin  - A court in Hamburg late Friday issued arrest warrants for the nine pirates captured earlier this week by the German Navy off the coast of Somalia.

The state's attorney requested the arrests based on charges of an attack on traffic on the high seas, justice spokesman Wilhelm Moellers told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

The German government had been seeking the transfer of the suspects to Kenya, a move that was sealed Friday morning in an agreement with the European Union.

The German Defence Ministry said the frigate "Rheinland-Pfalz," where the pirates have been held since Tuesday, had already set course for the Kenyan port city of Mombasa. The frigate apprehended them when the pirates attacked a German merchant vessel off Somalia with anti-tank missiles and firearms.

The frigate forms part of the EU's anti-pirate mission Atalanta, operating in the Gulf of Aden.

The arrest warrants do not strictly require that a criminal prosecution would be carried out in Germany, Moellers emphasized. The state's attorney must first check out the details of the Kenya-EU agreement.

But prosecution officials believed there was enough basis for prosecuting the pirates in Germany, according to a ZDF broadcast report that cited military sources. Such plans were confirmed to dpa by sources in the government.

The names of the pirates have been given to Hamburg's justice officials, and the German military has turned over criminal evidence to prosecutors.

If the case moves forward in Germany, justice officials said German police would likely pick up the suspects in Djibouti, which the German Navy uses as its base of operations. Theoretically, however, the pirates could also apply for asylum there once on land.

The EU-Kenya agreement was signed in Nairobi by Kenyan Foreign Minister Moses Wetang'ula and the Czech ambassador to Kenya, according to German foreign ministry spokesman Jens Ploetner. The Czech Republic is the current chair of the EU.

A specially convened commission, representing Germany's Interior, Foreign, Defence and Justice ministries, met this week to discuss the legal status of the pirates.

They now need to decide whether German interests were at stake during the attack.

Since the MV Courier, owned by a Bremen-based shipping company, had been sailing under an Antiguan flag, with a non-German crew, this could be questionable.

For this reason the deal with Kenya was crucial, as it has cleared the way for the nine men to be handed over to face prosecution there.

The Rheinland Pfalz is currently on course to reach the Kenyan port of Mombasa on Tuesday. According to the EU regulations the mission is operating under, pirates can be held for 12 days.

Kenya is a neighbouring country to Somalia, where many of the pirates operating in the Gulf of Aden are from.

In 2008, pirates seized more than 200 ships off the Somali coast, demanding millions of dollars in ransom. (dpa)