British war graves looted as three Royal Navy ships that sank in WWII go MISSING from seabed off Indonesia
Government demands probe after wrecks of HMS Exeter, HMS Electra and HMS Encounter found to have vanished
THE wrecks of three Royal Navy battleships that were sunk in a ferocious WWII battle have disappeared from their final resting place on the seabed.
HMS Exeter, HMS Electra and HMS Encounter went down off the coast of Indonesia during the Battle of the Java Sea in 1942.
There they have laid for the best part of 75 years, until a recent expedition revealed that they had vanished from the ocean floor – just one day after it emerged three nearby Dutch wrecks had also gone missing.
It has been suggested that the wrecks – considered sacred war graves – were taken for scrap metal, according to .
Illegal salvage crews have been known to pose as fishermen while diving to strip wrecks in the region.
Heavy cruiser HMS Exeter and destroyer HMS Encounter were almost completely gone, a report on the expedition said.
And large parts of HMS Electra, a destroyer, appear to have been looted.
An American submarine, the USS Perch, is also said to have disappeared in its entirety, leaving little more than its imprint on the seabed.
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Naval warships and war graves are protected under international law and the desecration of such shipwrecks is illegal.
And the government has now urged Indonesia to probe the wrecks’ disappearance, as the 75th anniversary of their final engagement with the enemy approaches.
"The British government is distressed to hear that a number of British naval Royal Navy vessels, lost in 1942 during the Battle of the Java Sea, have apparently been illegally salvaged," a spokesman for the Ministry of Defence (MoD) said yesterday.
Britain called on the Indonesian authorities to "take appropriate action" to protect the sites from further disturbance, the spokesman added.
"A military wreck should remain undisturbed and those who lost their lives on board should be allowed to rest in peace," he said.
Eight men died on the Encounter along with 54 on the Exeter, while the majority of the Electra’s crew of 145 are thought to have perished when she went down.
The four vessels sank when Japan's navy overpowered British, American, Dutch and Australian ships in what was one of the Allied forces' most disastrous naval defeats in history.
The Allied fleet commander, Dutch rear-admiral Karel Doorman was killed in the battle along with 2,300 sailors – compared to just 36 on the Japanese side.
The Dutch defence ministry said the wrecks of HNLMS De Ruyter and HNLMS Java had "seemingly gone completely missing", while a large piece of HNLMS Kortenaer had also vanished.
The discoveries were made by an international expedition which sailed to the wreck site in preparation for next year's 75th anniversary of the battle.
It is believed that, on finding the Dutch wrecks had disappeared, the net was widened to check other nearby WWII wrecks.
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