ReCAAP: Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships on the Rise in Asia

A total of 20 acts of piracy and armed robbery against ships in Asia were reported in May 2015, a 19% increase compared to April 2015, the Regional Cooperation Agreement on Combating Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships in Asia (ReCAAP) reports.

Out of the 20 incidents reported in May, two were acts of piracy and 18 were incidents of robbery onboard ship. 14 incidents occurred onboard ships while underway and six onboard ships at anchor/berth.

From January 2015 till May 2015, a total of 80 incidents had been reported, comprising 75 actual incidents and five attempted incidents.

This accounts for a similar increase of 19% in the number of incidents compared to the same period in 2014.

Notably, January-May 2015 recorded the highest number of actual incidents among the five-year reporting period, indicating that more incidents had occurred in 2015; and these were mostly incidents reported in the Straits of Malacca and Singapore (SOMS).

A total of 11 incidents occurred in SOMS in May; of which 10 were actual incidents and one was an attempted incident. Of these, seven were petty theft incidents. There was a Category 1 incident involving the siphoning of fuel/oil from a Singapore-registered petroleum product tanker, Ocean Energy in the Malacca Strait.

Similar to previous trends, majority of the incidents reported in SOMS occurred when the vessels were underway in the eastbound lane of the Traffic Separation Scheme (TSS). Eight of the 11 incidents were reported in the eastbound lane of the TSS in May 2015.