10 Indonesians arrested in HK for ship piracy

10 Indonesians arrested in HK for ship piracy

JAKARTA (JP): Chinese coastal security authorities confirmed
on Wednesday that they had arrested 10 suspected Indonesian
pirates who allegedly took over a Thai tanker last June, Antara
reported.

The men were arrested while sailing the stolen Thai tanker
into Chinese territorial waters off southeastern coastal
Guangdong province in June.

The Siam Xanxai tanker had been carrying 2,000 tons of diesel
fuel from Singapore to Thailand, Antara said.

The men allegedly blocked the tanker with two motorized
vessels while it was at sea between Singapore and Malaysia. They
then forced the 15 member Thai crew onboard the ship into one of
the smaller vessels, while holding another crew member hostage.
All the crew members were rescued.

In August, Chinese authorities arrested a Chinese man who with
his Indonesian partners had allegedly massacred 23 seamen on a
Panamanian cargo ship in the South China Sea last year.

In February, China came under attack during a conference in
Singapore organized by the International Maritime Bureau (IMB)
for failing to take stern measures to clamp down on ship
hijackings.

The maritime bureau accused China of not respond directly to
an IMB paper which criticized it for failing to prosecute pirates
it caught red-handed in an incident involving a Malaysian-
registered tanker last year.

Some Chinese navy personnel have also been accused of
involvement in piracy, but Beijing has flatly rejected the
claims.(imn)