ANKARA, Feb 5 (Reuters) - The Turkish government presented to parliament on Thursday a memorandum to allow Turkey to deploy its navy off the Somali coast to prevent pirates hijacking its ships, state-run Anatolian news agency said.

Several Turkish ships have been among vessels hijacked by pirates off the coast of Somalia in recent months. The agency said the memorandum envisaged a one-year limit for the deployment. No further details were immediately available.

Piracy in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean shipping lanes has sent insurance prices soaring, forced some owners to decide to go around South Africa instead of through the Suez Canal, and brought an unprecedented deployment of foreign warships to the region. Two Turkish ships hijacked last year were released by Somali pirates last month. (Writing by Daren Butler)

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