Plans are afoot to restructure the Maritime Security Task Force to deal with piracy at sea, including beefing up its assets.
"That review is expected to be complete in the next few months," Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen said yesterday in a written parliamentary reply to Mr Christopher de Souza (Holland-Bukit Timah GRC).
Extra measures are useful to prevent more piracy and sea robberies in the Singapore Strait, said Dr Ng.
The task force of the Singapore navy was set up in 2009 and works with law enforcement and maritime agencies to guard Singapore's waters, including carrying out daily patrols, as well as boarding and escort operations in the Singapore Strait.
The number of piracy and sea robberies in the waterway "fluctuates considerably from year to year", Dr Ng said. There were 48 cases in 2014, 104 in 2015 and 31 last year.
In the remaining seven years of the past decade, an average of 12 incidents took place annually.
Pirates and robbers in the Singapore Strait are based and operate outside the Republic's territorial waters, Dr Ng added.
To battle them, he said, the Singapore navy, among other things, works daily with other local maritime agencies such as the Police Coast Guard and Maritime and Port Authority, through the Singapore Maritime Crisis Centre.
In a separate written reply to Non-Constituency MP Dennis Tan, Transport Minister Khaw Boon Wan said the Singapore Strait does not only include Singapore territorial waters, so the fight against piracy and armed robbery requires "strong collaboration among all regional partners".
In the past two months, there were 12 incidents in the strait.
As none took place in Singapore's territorial waters, no investigations were required by local agencies, Mr Khaw added. "If an incident happens in Singapore territorial waters, the Singapore Police Coast Guard (PCG) will investigate.
Dr Ng, in his reply, said that when the incidents occur outside Singapore waters, such as transnational maritime piracy, robbery and other security threats, Singapore works with the navies and coast guards of Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand.
"Most recently, at the 14th Malacca Straits Patrol (MSP) Joint Coordination Committee meeting, the navies of Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand revised the MSP standard operating procedures to enhance the region's ability to tackle sea robbery in the straits of Malacca and Singapore," he added.
The countries are committed to holding quarterly exercises to improve information-exchange processes, and will use a new set of indicators to identify anything suspicious when investigating sea robberies, Dr Ng said.
"Beyond regular conduct of sea and air patrols under the MSP, joint training and exercises, as well as information sharing, strengthen understanding and collaboration to deal with maritime incidents together," he added.
