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Pirates who commandeered a Malaysian-flagged tanker in the South China Sea have escaped from the vessel in a lifeboat, giving warships the slip under cover of night, the country’s naval commander said.
State-run Bernama news agency quoted Malaysian coast guard officials as saying all 22 of the MT Orkim Harmony’s crew were safe, though one was slightly injured.
“(The pirates) escaped from the tanker last night using a rescue boat,” Royal Malaysian Navy chief Admiral Abdul Aziz Jaafar said.
He gave no further details on how the pirates managed to get away, but said the navy would soon issue a statement.
Abdul Aziz was earlier quoted by Malaysian media as dismissing the hijackers as amateurs, vowing they would not escape.
The vessel was the latest victim of increasingly bold pirates behind an upsurge of sea hijackings in Southeast Asia in the past two years, typically targeting smaller tankers carrying valuable petrol, diesel or gas oil.
The ship went missing a week ago with a cargo of about 6,000 tonnes of petrol worth an estimated 21 million ringgit (US$5.6 million).
The pirates who Abdul Aziz said numbered at least eight people armed with guns and machetes who spoke with “Indonesian” accents – were later found to have clumsily altered the ship’s name to “Kim Harmon” by painting over the letters.
That failed to fool an air and sea search effort, which located the tanker near Vietnamese and Cambodian waters late Wednesday. Malaysian naval warships subsequently shadowed the ship, urging the pirates to surrender.
The London-based International Maritime Bureau (IMB) has repeatedly warned that Southeast Asian waters are becoming the world’s most piracy-prone, calling for decisive action by regional authorities to prevent the situation spiralling out of control.
Attacks on slow-moving, smaller coastal tankers like the MT Orkim Harmony are occurring roughly once every two weeks, the IMB said recently, with pirates usually siphoning off cargoes to other vessels before later releasing the tankers and crews.
Officials had said on Thursday the MT Orkim Harmony’s cargo appeared to be intact.
Abdul Aziz was quoted by The Star newspaper as deriding the ship’s attackers as “part-timers on their maiden voyage into the world of piracy.”
The tanker was now headed to the port of Kuantan on the country’s eastern coast, escorted by the navy, he said.
The vessel had been sailing to Kuantan from Malaysia’s west coast when it went missing June 11.
Its crew included 16 Malaysians, five Indonesians and a Myanmar national.
Southeast Asia saw 38 pirate attacks during January-March, or 70 per cent of the global total of 54, the IMB said in April.
A scourge for centuries, piracy in Southeast Asia had been significantly reduced over the past decade thanks to stepped-up regional cooperation and maritime patrols, but has re-emerged.


Pirates who hijacked Malaysian tanker escape in lifeboat giving warships the slip 

The deputy director of the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, Ahmad Puzi Abdul Kahar, show a picture of missing tanker. Photo: AP

The missing Malaysian oil tanker is shown during a press conference on June 18 in Putrajaya, Malaysia. Photo: Xinhua

'Hijacked' Malaysian tanker found in Cambodian waters with fresh coat of paint

The deputy director of the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, Ahmad Puzi Abdul Kahar, shows a picture of missing tanker. Photo: AP