A helicopter of the Chinese naval fleet attends a landing exercise at night on December 28, 2008, while the Chinese naval fleet heads for the Gulf of Aden. The Chinese naval fleet including two destroyers and a supply ship set off on December 26 for waters off Somalia for an escort mission against piracy. [Xinhua]

The Chinese naval task force en route to the Gulf of Aden and waters off Somalia for an escort mission against pirates will enter the Indian Ocean on Tuesday.

The fleet, two destroyers and one supply ship, on Monday passed through the Malacca Strait after a three-day voyage, which started from China's Hainan Province.

During the voyage, members of a special force unit aboard the warships carried out anti-piracy training with a ship-borne helicopter, from which they dropped by rope onto the deck to simulate landing on hijacked or pirate vessels.

According to the Xinhua reporter aboard the Navy's flagship destroyer DDG-169 Wuhan, the helicopter crews also finished a lifting and landing exercise in the dark.

When passing through the Malacca Strait, an international waterway between the Pacific and Indian oceans, the reporter observed an increasing number of vessels including oil tankers, container ships and some Chinese merchant ships.

(Xinhua News Agency December 30, 2008)