State news agency Bernama, quoting Malaysia’s Chief of Navy Admiral Abdul Aziz Jaafar, reported that the vessel had been repainted and renamed.
“We have found the vessel and RMAF, MMEA and RAAF aircraft are tailing it from the air,” Jaafar told Bernama, referring to the Malaysian air force and maritime enforcement agency, and the Royal Australian Air Force, the New Straits Times reported.
The newswire reported that a senior navy official who was directly involved in the search efforts said the lead was following a sighting of the ship by an Australian aircraft.
Malaysia’s navy was urging the hijackers to surrender, the country’s naval chief said on Thursday.
The vessel had been given fresh touches of paint and had its name changed to ‘Kim Harmon’, according to photos released by the navy.
A patrol vessel was shadowing the tanker and communicating with its hijackers in a bid to secure their surrender, Jaafar said on his Twitter feed.
“At least eight perpetrators are on board. They are armed with pistols and parangs (machetes). They speak with Indonesian accent(s),” he added.“All crew are safe and unharmed.”
The vessel was in Vietnamese waters, about 200 miles northeast of Kota Bahru, officials said.
They estimated that the value of the ‘Orkim Harmony’s’ cargo of 50,000 barrels of RON95 gasoline was 21 mill ringgit ($5.6 mill).
She was en route from Malacca on Malaysia’s west coast to the port of Kuantan on the east coast. Her owners lost contact with the ship last Thursday while it was off the southern state of Johor.
The vessel was spotted on Wednesday by a search and rescue operation, officials said.
Her owners, Malaysia’s Orkim Ship Management, has said the tanker’s cargo appeared untouched after analysing photos of the hijacked vessel, according to Ahmad Puzi, a Malaysian coast guard official.
This was the second incident in the same area this month.
Earlier, the 7,100 dwt tanker ‘Orkim Victory’ carrying diesel loaded from Petronas was hijacked on 4th June in the same area and on the same route.