Feb 26, 2010
MANILA - A SINGAPORE-FLAGGED tug hijacked off Malaysia three weeks ago has been found on a remote southern Philippine island, but the last of 12 crew members remains missing, the coastguard said on Friday. Local police found the 296-tonne Asta beached on the north coast of the tiny island of Dinagat on Thursday, a coastguard statement said. Philippine navy officers boarded the vessel and detained a 19-year-old local man, who described himself as the boat's caretaker, it added. The tug was boarded by masked pirates armed with assault rifles and machetes on Feb 6 off Tioman island on the east coast of peninsular Malaysia while en route to Cambodia from Singapore with 12 crew members. Eleven Indonesians among the crew were set adrift on a life raft five days later and were rescued near a Malaysian navy post off Borneo island after surviving at sea for eight days. But the final crew member, believed to be the chief engineer, was still missing, the coastguard said Friday. Philippine coastguard commander Admiral Wilfredo Tamayo said authorities would file 'appropriate charges' against an unnamed person identified by the detained man as the person who had instructed him to guard the beached tug. -- AFP
