Search for oil tanker

Malaysian and Indonesian maritime authorities were last night searching for an oil tanker with 10 crew members that had disappeared in an apparent hijacking.

Malaysia’s Maritime Enforcement Agency chief Ahmad Puzi Kahar said yesterday that the MT Vier Harmoni was suspected of having been hijacked after leaving a port in Malaysia’s southern Johor state and taken to waters off the Indonesian island of Batam, near Singapore.

Indonesia’s western naval command and its coast guard said they also were searching for the tanker but there was no indication it had entered Batam.

Vier Abdul Jamal, chief executive of the ship’s owner Vierlines Asia Group, said the Indonesian-flagged vessel had 10 Indonesian crew on board and is currently chartered by another company.

The charterer and the harbour master where the vessel was being loaded lost contact with Vier Harmoni on Tuesday evening local time and its tracking device was not active, he said.

The vessel could have been hijacked, could have sunk or could be suffering engine problems, he said.

The Malaysian maritime agency said the tanker was carrying 900,000 litres of diesel and left from Tanjung Pelepas port in Johor.

Ahmad Puzi, the agency’s chief, said “internal problems” might be behind the disappearance.

The 53m long Vier Harmoni was built in 2014.