Malaysian Navy Tailing Hijacked ORKIM HARMONY Off Vietnam

KUALA LUMPUR, June 18 (Reuters) – A Malaysian naval vessel has made contact with the pirates onboard hijacked tanker Orkim Harmony and is attempting to steer them to give up, a maritime official mentioned on Thursday.

The tanker as of midday (0400 GMT) was in Vietnamese waters headed south with the Malaysian navy vessel KD Terengganu and a maritime ship in pursuit.

[contextly_sidebar id=”8b2ljBUWnKYx9OxnRa7dlzQgH6uARrDG”]Both the crew and the cargo onboard the tanker are secure, and the navy is negotiating with the robbers by way of the captain of the Orkim Harmony, mentioned Vice Admiral Ahmad Puzi, deputy director normal of the operations unit of the Malaysia Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA), in a press briefing.

“From our experience, as long as there’s no situation that alarms the criminals, the crew will be safe,” Ahmad Puzi mentioned.

“We are using a soft approach first, trying to advise them to surrender,” he mentioned, including that the temper of the negotiations is “good”.

The 7,300 deadweight tonne (DWT) Orkim Harmony was hijacked on June 11 about 30 nautical miles from the Johor port of Tanjung Sedili carrying round 50,000 barrels of RON95 gasoline, within the second such incident in the identical space this month.

MT KIM HARMON

The Orkim Harmony is operated by Malaysia’s Orkim Ship Management. On board is a crew of twenty-two, together with 16 Malaysians, 5 Indonesians and one Myanmar nationwide.

After the tanker was hijacked, the pirates repainted the ship and adjusted the identify to Kim Harmon.

Malaysia’s Chief of Navy Admiral Abdul Aziz Jaafar mentioned on his Twitter account that not less than eight perpetrators have been on board the Orkim Harmony armed with pistols and machetes.

Malaysian state oil agency Petronas instructed Reuters that the Orkim Harmony was carrying 6,000 metric tonnes of product from its Malacca refinery to the port of Kuantan on the east coast of Peninsular Malaysia for distribution.

It mentioned “all necessary measures are being taken to ensure undisrupted fuel supply to consumers in the East Coast region.”

Earlier this month, a 7,100 DWT oil tanker, Orkim Victory, carrying diesel loaded from Petronas was hijacked on June 4 in the identical space and on the identical route.

The Orkim Victory was later launched by the hijackers after about 770 metric tonnes (6,000 barrels) of its cargo had been siphoned off.

It will, nevertheless, be tough for the pirates to siphon off the gasoline from the Harmony as it’s extremely flammable and they’re possible on the lookout for correct services to do a ship-to-ship switch, Ahmad Puzi had instructed reporters on Monday.

The two hijackings have raised additional issues over piracy in Southeast Asia, maritime officers mentioned on Monday. (Reporting by Anuradha Raghu; Editing by Tom Hogue)

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