A British man, 46, a 14-year-old Dutchman, an 18-year-old Frenchwoman, and a 35-year-old Norwegian woman disappeared after going diving near a small island, they said.

A search involving vessels from the coastguard, police and the fisheries department was launched at 2.45pm, senior coastguard official Nurul Hizam Zakaria said in a statement.

The island where they disappeared, Pulau Tokong Sanggol, is about 15km off the coast of Johor.

The area is popular with foreign and domestic visitors, with resorts dotted along the coast and on nearby islands.

Diving accidents, while rare, do occasionally take place in Malaysia.

In 2013, a British tourist died when she was struck by a passing boat’s propeller while diving off resort islands in the South China Sea.

Malaysia’s white-sand beaches and lush rainforests have long made it a major draw, but the tourism industry was hit hard by travel curbs during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The country’s borders reopened to foreign tourists last week after a two-year closure.