Somalian pirates have freed a crude oil-laden Suezmax oil tanker belonging to Greece's Dynacom Tankers Management after holding it for almost a year, a source at the company's Mumbai office in India told Platts Monday.

The 2011-built Smyrni was carrying 135,000 mt, or 1 million barrels, of crude when it was taken by Somalian pirates on March 11 last year while sailing through the Arabian Sea.

Shipping sources said Monday that the vessel, which had a 26-member crew on board, was released by the pirates last Thursday or Friday. The source at Dynacom said: "The vessel has left Somalia. But I don't know where it is heading to."

According to ship tracking tool Platts cTrack, the Smyrni was last shown steaming at a speed of 5.4 knots in the Arabian Sea on March 9. The vessel's draught was shown as 15 metres, implying the tanker is fully laden.

An official at the Omani port of Salalah told Platts that the "pirate-released" Smyrni is expected to arrive at the port on March 13.

The vessel was hijacked last year after it loaded a cargo of Azeri Light crude at the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan and was heading to Pertamina's 260,000 b/d Balikpapan refinery in Indonesia, Platts reported earlier. Pertamina spokesman Mochamad Harun said then that the crude belonged to his company.

The current condition of the cargo is not known and Harun could not be reached for comment Monday.

The Smyrni was the largest tanker to be hijacked by pirates in the Arabian Sea or Gulf of Aden in more than a year. The last big tanker to be hijacked by Somalian pirates, who operate in the Gulf of Aden and Arabian Sea, was the Italian Aframax vessel Savina Caylyn in February 2011. That tanker was carrying a cargo of Nile Blend crude.

Source: Platts