A hijacked supertanker carrying up to US$100 million worth of crude oil,  the largest vessel seized to date in an escalating regional piracy crisis was believed to have anchored off Somalia Tuesday, its operator said. The Sirius Star's crew of 25, including British, Croatian, Polish, Filipino and Saudi nationals, are reported to be safe, according to Dubai-based Vela International Marine. The Saudi-owned vessel was seized on Saturday more than 450 nautical miles southeast of Mombasa, Kenya in what Saudi Arabia's foreign minister called "an outrageous act."

The incident is the latest in a series of major acts of piracy around the Gulf of Aden that have cost the international shipping industry millions of dollars and threatened a key global trade route. The U.S. Navy's Fifth Fleet said it was not expecting to send ships to intercept the tanker. NATO also said it would not divert any of three ships currently in the Gulf of Aden, The Associated Press reported.  Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal, speaking during a visit to Athens, condemned the hijacking, saying: "piracy, like terrorism, is a disease which is against everybody, and everybody must address it together," according to AP.

U.S. Navy Fifth Fleet Cmdr. Jane Campbell said the tanker  flagged in Liberia and owned by the Saudi Aramco company weighed more than 300,000 metric tons and was more than three times the size of a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier. A multinational naval force including vessels from the U.S., the UK and Russia has been patrolling the Indian Ocean waters seas near the Gulf of Aden, which connects the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea, following a sharp increase in pirate attacks in the region.