Armed pirates stormed a gas tanker at anchor in Indonesia firing several shots at the crew, the latest in a string of attacks in the country's troubled waters, an ocean crime watchdog said on Tuesday. The International Maritime Bureau (IMB) said five men armed with automatic rifles boarded a Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) tanker anchored at Anyer on Monday and fired at the crew before escaping with equipment.
No one was injured in the shootout but the IMB's director, Captain Pottengal Mukundan, classed the attack as extremely serious. "This is very dangerous because an LPG tanker is the last place you want to have a gun battle," he told Reuters.
"It is extremely dangerous and we call upon the Indonesian authorities to patrol anchorages where there are vulnerable vessels."
In its half yearly piracy report on Monday the IMB ranked Indonesian waters as the world's most dangerous, with 50 attacks reported, or more than a quarter of the world's total.
The IMB also reported two new attacks in the Malacca Straits, one of the world's busiest sea lanes.
It said armed men opened fire on a cargo ship after boarding, damaging the vessel. In another attack in the strait, pirates in seven small craft tried to attack another oil tanker at sea but were beaten off by fire hoses.
The watchdog has repeatedly warned of a "potential human and environmental catastrophe" if an oil tanker is deliberately scuttled in the strategic sea lane.
The narrow strait between Malaysia and Indonesia, with Singapore at its southern entrance, carries more than a quarter of world trade and almost all of Japan and China's oil imports.
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