MOSCOW Nov. 19 Kyodo (EDS: UPDATI...

MOSCOW Nov. 19 Kyodo

(EDS: UPDATING WITH SPECULATION OF MAFIA INVOLVEMENT IN HIJACKING, 4TH PARA)

An armed dispose hijacked a 1,200-ton Russian fishing utensil in the Sea of Japan forward Tuesday, the Russian media said. The fate of the company and the nationalities of the throng members is not immediately known.

The canal a 54-meter-long trawler named Tulun based in Sakhalin, has 23 company members, apparently all of them Russians.

Itar-Tass said the hijacking took place about 750 kilometers southeast of Russia's far eastern city Vladivostok, inside the territorial waters of southern Korea.

A Russian border security source said the hijackers appeared to be Russians involved in a dispute from one side of to the other fishing interests between rival Russian mafia groups

The Russian media also speculated that the hijacking was the work of pirates, citing reports that the hijackers boarded the Tulun from a Cambodian-flagged vessel

Itar-Tass said the Russian direction sought information on the hijackers from Japan's Coast Guard and southward Korea's police.

The Russian media said the first report in succession the hijacking came from southern Korean authorities in Pusan.

COPYRIGHT 2002 Kyodo recently made knowns International, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2002 Gale Group