Bangkok Post / Kyodo News
June 19, 2015

KUALA LUMPUR — Vietnamese authorities have detained eight suspected Indonesian hijackers of a Malaysian oil tanker who abandoned the vessel with its 22 crew and fled after authorities closed in on them by sea and air, officials said on Friday.

Malaysian navy chief Abdul Aziz Jaafar reported on Twitter that the eight were found on a lifeboat off Vietnam's Tho Chu Island on Friday morning. "They claimed their fishing boat sank," he said, adding that that authorities were investigating the matter.

Earlier, he said in a statement that the eight suspected hijackers of the MT Orkim Harmony had escaped in a "rescue boat" while trying to steer the tanker toward Indonesia's Natuna islands on Thursday night.

The MT Orkim Harmony was en route to Kuantan port in Malaysia's east coast state of Pahang from Malacca in the west coast when communication was lost on June 11, triggering a search that involved Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and Australia.

An Australian air force reconnaissance plane, flying out of its base in Malaysia's northern Penang state, spotted the tanker on Wednesday in the Gulf of Thailand within the Vietnamese maritime border. It was some 600 nautical miles away from the ship's last known position, which was off the east coast of Malaysia's southern Johor state.

full article: Vietnam holds tanker hijackers | Bangkok Post: news