Family mourn Briton killed by pirates in Thailand as navy hunts for body

As three Burmese migrant workers appeared in court on charges of kidnap and theft, a flotilla of ships and helicopters criss-crossed the area where the body of 64-year-old Mr Robertson is thought to have been thrown from the 44ft yacht Mr Bean.

The renewed search came as Mr Robertson's widow Linda was joined in Thailand by her sons and step-children. Mrs Robertson, 57, from St Leonards, East Sussex, had an emotional reunion with her two sons, Darren, 37, and Ben Trevitt, 35, and her husband's children from a previous marriage, Dean, 34, and Tara, 38.

Mrs Robertson told how she realised that the three young men who boarded the couple's boat off Buntang Island near Malaysia were "not professional" pirates.

She said of her husband: "I know in my heart he was just trying to protect me. He dearly loved his children and grandchildren, who called him 'Mr Fixit' and he was fulfilling his life's dream to retire at 50 and sail the world. We had completed most of the trip. Next year we planned to sail back home.

"When we were boarded, I knew Malcolm must have felt he had to get these people off the boat and that might have been a mistake. Perhaps if he had taken a more relaxed attitude. Who knows? He might be alive now."

She spoke both of the brutality of her attackers, who tied her up while they ransacked the yacht, and the gentleness of the youngest, an 18-year-old Burmese known as Ek.

Mrs Robertson said: "I was tied so strongly that I was almost passing out. At one point they loosened the ropes, and the young Burmese man started stroking and massaging my feet."

Earlier she described how the gang had entered her husband's cabin and she heard him shouting "Get off my boat". She heard a scuffle and never saw her husband again. She then had to stand in his blood as she followed the pirates' orders, allowing the boat to sail eight miles north to Satun.

Most of the time, however, she said she was "tied up naked like a trussed chicken". She was finally able to make her escape when the Burmese got into the yacht's tender, allowing her to cast off the connecting rope.

The Thai authorities are now seeking a quick trial for the three men. They will be arraigned again tomorrow but the youngest will have to be tried in a juvenile court. The renewed air-sea operation came after British Embassy officials met with officials from Thailand's navy to urge them to step up the search for Mr Robertson. There are concerns that without a body murder charges cannot be pressed.