There is no proof that pirates in the Malacca Straits have teamed up with terrorists, maritime security experts attending an international conference said today.

The piracy-prone strait, which carries a third of world trade, has been the focus of increasing concern over the possibility of seaborne attacks by al-Qaeda or its regional offshoot, the Jemaah Islamiah (JI).

"We have not seen any evidence of terrorists using commercial pirates to do their work," said P Mukundan, director of the London-based International Maritime Bureau (IMB), which organised the conference.

Deputy Internal Security Minister Chia Kwang Chye told a news conference: "At this moment, there is no proof of terrorist links between piracy or those who commit robberies on the Straits of Malacca."

US-based terrorism expert Brian Jenkins, keynote speaker at the meeting which drew more than 175 delegates from 33 countries, cautioned that the threat of seaborne terror should not be overblown.

"We should take the problem of terrorism seriously but at the same time, I think there is a danger in exaggerating threats.

"I don't think it is appropriate to blend the increasing problems of piracy with the potentially more dangerous consequences of terrorism.

"Piracy is not an indication of terrorism. Every missing ship does not become part of (Osama) bin Laden's navy," he told the meeting.

Floating bomb

While a link between pirates and terrorists was a possibility, he pointed out that they were not natural allies, with pirates being driven by economics rather than ideology.

Jenkins said possible terrorist actions at sea included suicide bombings against tankers or passenger vessels, a biological attack on a cruise liner, a hijacked ship rammed into a port and the use of a shipping container to deliver weapons of mass destruction.

"Perhaps the scenario of greatest concern is the hijacking and grounding of a large vessel to block a vital sea lane. The Malacca Straits is often used as an example of great concern in this matter," he told the meeting.

The narrow waterway bordered by Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia is used by some 50,000 ships a year carrying a third of world trade and half its oil supplies.

The IMB's Mukundan told AFP on the sidelines of the meeting that much of the recent alarm about security in the strait had been caused by a report that armed men had hijacked a tanker for a few hours, learned how to maneouvre it and then left.

This was interpreted as a practise run for using a tanker as a floating bomb, but Mukundan said there was no truth in the report, which has been widely carried in the international media.

Mukundan said Malaysia and Singapore "have done a lot to ensure their part of the strait is very safe.

"But Indonesia has got a very large resource problem and what we would like to see is the Indonesian authorities giving greater priority to piracy by allocating the resources to ensure that law enforcement agencies can deal with it."

Indonesia's navy chief Admiral Bernard Kent Sondakh said Tuesday that Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore had agreed to carry out year-round joint naval patrols in the strait. - AFP