Piracy in the Gulf of Aden will only be defeated by a strong government in Somalia, the commander of the French naval operation in the Indian Ocean said on Sunday. "We will not end this phenomenon unless we have a Somali government that has the means to act on its territory to fight piracy," Vice-Admiral Gerard Valin said on the sidelines of a regional security conference in the Bahraini capital. Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed on Sunday announced he had sacked Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein and his government, in the latest development in their power struggle. Valin also hailed the European Union naval mission in the Gulf of Aden as a major step in battling the surge in attacks and hijackings by ransom-hunting Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden, a crucial maritime trade route.