No injuries or deaths have been reported from the raid, which came to the attention of the Royal Thai Navy this morning at about 9.40am.
Initial reports said that a Thai freighter, Lapin, manned by a crew of 10, had been forcefully boarded by six to eight pirates, three of whom were armed with guns, the others with swords.
According to the Thai crew, the pirates managed to siphon some 2,000 tonnes of residual fuel [Naam Mun Tao in Thai], and another five tonnes of diesel fuel, which had been procured in Singapore.
It is not clear whether any of the TNT the pirates had left on the bridge had been detonated, but it has already been neutralized by a special bomb unit dispatched from Songkhla.
The Thai ship and its crew are now safely anchored in Satun, between Koh Tarutao and Koh Lipe.
According to this report, piracy is on the rise in Southeast Asia.