Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad said initial investigations had ruled out foul play in the explosion of a supertanker chartered to national oil company Petronas in Yemeni waters last Sunday.

Mahathir cited a Petronas report as attributing the blast to a technical problem on the 330m-long supertanker managed by French company, France Shipmanagement.

Yesterday, AFP quoted a French diplomat in Yemen as saying that the blast was caused by a deliberate attack on the tanker as it approached an offshore terminal some 700km east of Aden.

"The oil tanker was rammed by a small boat stuffed with explosives. It seems to be an attack in the same style as the USS Cole ," French Vice Consul Marcel Goncalves reportedly said.