Despite official denials, the crew of a French oil tanker that caught fire off Yemen last week insist that the accident was the result of a deliberate act, reports Nasser Arrabyee from Sana'a Click to view caption The captain of a French oil tanker that exploded and caught fire off Yemen said a member of his crew saw a fishing boat approach the tanker before the blast, leading him to believe it was a deliberate act of sabotage. "The way the explosion happened it could not be due to a technical problem," Limburg Captain Hubert Ardillon told reporters. "At least the first explosion occurred on the outside of the ship. I am positive about that... I saw it," said Ardillon. "I totally rule out the theory of an accident," he said, adding that he was counting on the recently- arrived team of French investigators to determine the causes behind the blast. The French Embassy in Sana'a said a small boat packed with explosives rammed the tanker on Sunday, recalling the 12 October Islamist attack two years ago on the USS Cole in Aden harbour that killed 17 sailors. The fact the accident took place almost on the 1st anniversary of the US-led war on Afghanistan also added to fears that Osama Bin Laden's Al- Qa'eda organisation could be behind the attack. "The oil tanker was rammed by a small boat stuffed with explosives," French Vice-Consul Marcel Goncalves said. "It seems to be an attack in the same style as the USS Cole," he added. But the French Foreign Ministry stated that so far there was no proof of an organised attack. A US official said Monday that initial evidence suggested the explosion that crippled the Limburg was accidental, as Yemen has claimed, and not terrorism. Yemeni officials have insisted the Limburg was the victim of an accident and had quoted Ardillon as saying a fire broke out onboard first, setting off the blast. "The fire aboard the French tanker was caused by an explosion in one of the ship's reservoirs," an official source told Al-Ahram Weekly. The Hadramaut governorate, where the incident occurred, also released a statement saying simply that the explosion was caused "when the reservoirs filled with crude caught fire and the vessel was three nautical miles from the offshore terminal of Al- Dhabah." Ardillon later told reporters that the fire followed the explosion and refused to comment on the earlier reports that he said the fire started first. He added that one of the crew members told him the fishing boat was near the tanker's side but didn't say it hit the ship. At the time, the Limburg was nearing Mina Al-Dhabah, a port frequented by tankers loading oil that is close to Al-Mukalla, about 350 kilometres southeast of the capital Sana'a. Another Yemeni government official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said investigators questioned more than 20 fishermen in the area and they all said no fishing boat was near the tanker at the time of the explosion. Yemeni investigators said they had seen no debris or other signs of a small boat that might have caused or been affected by the explosion. Reporters taken near the tanker Monday also saw no such debris. "Nothing so far suggests it was a terrorist act," Yemeni Sea Transport Minister Said Yafaai, who heads the Yemeni investigating team, told reporters. "If it was a deliberate blast, the combination of explosive material and oil would have resulted in a much bigger blaze," the minister said, adding most of its load, some 300,000 barrels of crude oil, was still safely aboard the tanker. The tanker was carrying about 400,000 barrels of crude oil purchased by the Malaysian state company Petronas from Saudi Arabia. It was on its way to Yemen to fetch another 1.5 million barrels of crude to be brought to Malaysia for refining when the explosion occurred. Meanwhile, a team of US investigators arrived in the Yemeni capital, Sana'a, on Tuesday and headed to Al Mukalla to take part in the investigation. French investigators had arrived earlier to start the joint- probe with their Yemeni counterparts. Yemen has been eager to emphasise its commitment to the US- led war on terror and shake off its reputation as a hotbed of extremism. Reports suggested that Yemen has been a longtime base for suspected Al-Qa'eda members, and it is the Bin Laden family's ancestral home. Meanwhile, specialists in environment affairs said that it is too early to assess the environmental damage done by the accident, but they confirmed it could be drastic. "The damage inflicted on the sea life may lead to a halt in fishing, at least this season," said Deputy Minister of Tourism and Environment, Mohamed Kaflah. "There are more than 6,000 fishermen in this area that will become idle," he added. Two days before the tanker incident, the Yemeni authorities declared that 15 people accused of attacking the USS Cole would stand trial soon. "The trial will start as soon as the general prosecution has finished reviewing the files," an informed source said. The Yemeni parliament asked the government last week to speed up the trial of the USS Cole suspects and others detained by authorities following the 11 September attacks in New York and Washington. Nearly 90 people have been held in Yemen over the past year for alleged links to Al-Qa'eda. The government has also clamped down on several religious schools where it is believed followers of Bin Laden and other extremist groups received their strict education.
