Despite an ongoing oil block dispute, Indonesia and Malaysia are now joining hands to hunt down pirates who had earlier hijacked a Japanese-registered boat in the Strait of Malacca and kidnapped three seamen.

Indonesian navy spokesman Commodore Abdul Malik Yusuf said the Navy had dispatched three vessels to the area, near Malaysia's Penang and Pangkor islands, where the boat was believed to have been attacked.

"We are cooperating with the Malaysian and Singaporean navies in chasing them (the pirates)," Abdul Malik was quoted Wednesday by The Jakarta Post as saying.

The cooperation between the two countries was made possible despite a lingering sea border dispute where both Malaysia and Indonesia have claimed ownership of an offshore oil block in the Sulawesi Sea.

Although the two have decided to resolve the issue via diplomatic talks, the dispute last week saw warships and fighter jets deployed from both sides.

The relatively narrow 960-km-long Strait of Malacca, bordered by Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia, is used by an estimated 50,000 ships a year carrying a third of world trade and half of its oil supplies.

The three countries policing the strait launched coordinated naval patrols last year in a bid to better secure it against piracy and potential militant attacks, but attacks on shipping arestill on the rise, according to the International Maritime Bureau.

A gang of about 15 armed pirates attacked the Japanese Idaten tugboat off Penang Island on Monday night, holding the boat's Japanese captain Nuboa Inoa, boat's chief of engineer Shunyi Kuroaand a Filipino crewman Ido Gardo captive.

The attack came just three days after an Indonesian-registered gas tanker was hijacked by 35 heavily armed pirates who abducted acaptain and a chief engineer, whose fate remains uncertain.

The tugboat's remaining crew of six Japanese and five Filipinos,as well as more than 150 workers of various nationalities aboard abarge that it was pulling, were safe.

Source: Xinhua