Inside the navy’s search for war grave robbers in the South China Sea – National | 24CA News
More than 80,000 vessels journey by way of the South China Sea yearly — however the Royal Canadian Navy‘s HMCS Montreal has been on the hunt for just one.
“We were made aware of a Chinese de-rigging vessel that is reportedly dredging over (the) HMS Prince of Wales wreckage site,” said Navy Lt. Stephen Sipos, an operations officer on the HMCS Montreal currently deployed in the area.
Global News has a team on board the ship.
HMCS Montreal is on a six-month deployment from its home base in Halifax and over the last 10 days, Global News documented the work of the ship’s crew and the realities of leaving their households behind for a mission on the opposite facet of the world.
And this week, that work included making an attempt to thwart suspected grave robbers.
The HMS Prince of Wales was a British ship sunk by Japanese torpedoes in 1941.
While the British navy ship at the moment bearing the identical title is an plane provider, the ship in query was a battleship. Its sinking occurred simply days after the assault on Pearl Harbor and killed 327 on board.
Combined with the sinking of the HMS Repulse on the identical day close by, which killed greater than 500, the assaults marked one of many “worst disasters in British naval history,” based on the U.Okay.’s National Museum of the Royal Navy.
And the crew of the HMCS Montreal was trying to find a Chinese boat allegedly prepared to disturb these graves for a shot at Second World War memorabilia.
“We’re not here to escalate any tensions, we’re here to be a reporting asset for the navy,” Sipos mentioned.
To discover it, the Cyclone helicopter on board the Montreal has been dispatched
But after greater than an hour’s value of flying, no luck. An unsuccessful mission — however with a constructive twist.
“We weren’t able to locate them today, which is good because it means they weren’t in the vicinity of the wreckage they were pillaging,” mentioned Capt. Zach Austin of the HMCS Montreal.
The subsequent day, Malaysian authorities seized the Chinese boat and on board, discovered scrap metallic and cannon balls believed to be from the HMS Prince of Wales.
According to Reuters, officers from the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) pounced on the Chinese vessel when it anchored in Malaysian waters in east Johor with out permission on May 29.
In a press release, Johor Maritime Director First Admiral Nurul Hizam Zakaria mentioned the vessel was manned by 32 males together with the captain. The crew comprised 21 Chinese nationals, 10 Bangladeshi nationals and an area. They had been aged between 23 and 57 years.
The British High Commission has condemned the “deplorable” salvors who they mentioned had been unlawfully desecrating the struggle graves.
Malaysian authorities have additionally launched an investigation.
With recordsdata from Reuters.
