Pirates who had boarded a tugboat in the Singapore Strait fled after a warship from the Republic of Singapore Navy (RSN) closed in, reports said.
The Malaysian-flagged Permata 1 was subsequently escorted safely to Singapore waters by a patrol vessel of the RSN. None of the crew onboard were harmed, local media reported.
In the morning of Tuesday, Singapore’s Port Operations Control Centre received a signal from the tugboat that pirates were boarding it. The RSN’s Maritime Security Task Force (MSTF) immediately deployed the warship RSS Resilience and the pirates fled towards Indonesian waters on seeing the military ship.
After the RSN shared information on the incident with its Indonesian and Malaysian counterparts, three pirates were caught and a stolen cargo was recovered.
Frederick Chew, commander of the MSTF, said: “I am heartened to see the good cooperation between Singaporean, Indonesian and Malaysian enforcement agencies in disrupting the sea robbery attempt on Permata 1.”
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