Close military cooperation between Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia has dealt a major blow to pirates operating in the Malacca Straits, regional defense officials said today.

Malaysian armed forces chief Mohamad Anwar Mohamad Nor said the situation had substantially improved since the launch of joint naval and air patrols by the three states bordering the strategic waterway.

"The security situation in Malacca Straits is very stable. Very benign. The incidence of piracy has gone down," he told reporters on the sidelines of a defence exhibition outside Kuala Lumpur.

The head of the Piracy Reporting Centre of the London-based International Maritime Bureau (IMB), Noel Choong, said there were no attacks reported in first three months of 2006 compared to four in the same period a year ago.

"It is mainly due to the naval patrols by the Indonesian navy under Operation Gurita which was launched in July 2005," he told AFP .

Singapore's defence force chief Lieutenant-General Ng Yat Chung also said that attacks had declined with the introduction of coordinated navy patrols in 2004 and maritime air patrols last year.

"I believe the efforts put in by the littoral states have had an impact. We want to build on the success that we have so far," he said.

"I am confident we will be able to sustain the cooperation that we have establish so far."

Eyes in the Sky

The Malacca Straits, which separates the Indonesian island of Sumatra and peninsular Malaysia, is one of the world's most important waterways, with 50,000 ships carrying about one-third of world trade passing through it each year.

The IMB said that pirate attacks there had fallen to 12 in 2005, from 38 in 2004. However Indonesian waters remained treacherous, with almost 30 percent of the world's attacks despite a decline from the year before.

Mohamad Anwar said Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore recently signed an agreement in Indonesia's Batam island to cover the sharing of intelligence under the "Eyes in the Sky" air patrols.

"The three nations - Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore... believe that with the quick exchange of information, the response time (to an attack) will be much shorter," he said.