SINGAPORE, April 11 (The Straits Times/ANN): A Singapore-flagged tanker was boarded by pirates around 570km from the Ivory Coast at about 10pm on Monday.
The incident was first flagged by the Maritime Domain Awareness for Trade-Gulf of Guinea, a joint maritime monitoring effort by France and the United Kingdom. It said that an “unknown number” of pirates had boarded the tanker about 300 nautical miles south of the city of Abidjan.
As of Tuesday, the situation continues to be classified as ongoing. No further details were provided.
It is not known if there are any Singaporean crew members on board. The Straits Times has contacted the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore for more information.
The vessel, identified as the Success 9 by security consultant Praesidium International, is a chemical and oil product tanker.
According to ship tracking website MarineTraffic, Success 9 was built in 2003 and is owned by HS Ocean - a Singapore-registered company.
It was last sighted off the coast of Abidjan on March 22, the day it had departed the port.
Meanwhile, the UK-based security consultant EOS Risk Group had issued a warning advising vessels to keep clear of the area.
“It is likely that another vessel was used to support the pirates during the incident. Either a mothership was used to deploy a skiff, or a secondary tanker is in the vicinity to illegally offload the boarded vessel’s cargo,” it said.
The latest pirate attack comes after a similar incident on March 26 involving the Monjasa Reforme, a chemical and oil tanker sailing under Liberia. That took place about 260km off Pointe-Noire in the Republic of the Congo.
“(It) exemplifies West African pirates’ ability to conduct piracy at great range from the shore,” added the security consultant. - The Straits Times/ANN
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