The Ministry of Justice on Friday slapped sanctions on a local businessman suspected of selling oil to North Korea, banning all financial dealings with him and freezing his companies’ bank accounts.
Seoul last month said that it had in November last year detained a Hong Kong-registered ship suspected of transferring oil products to a North Korean vessel and breaching UN sanctions against the nuclear-armed regime.
Prosecutors last week said that a Taiwanese businessman surnamed Chen (陳) was under investigation for making a false declaration that a ship he chartered was bound for Hong Kong when it actually sailed to international waters to sell oil. He was released on bail and has not yet been formally charged.
Photo: AFP
The ministry on Friday announced sanctions against Chen Shih-hsien (陳世憲) and his solely owned Bunker’s Taiwan Group Corp, as well as Billions Bunker Group Corp (比利恩油品集團), both of which are registered offshore.
Two other entities backed by Chen — Oceanic Enterprise Co Ltd and UMC Corp Peru SAC — were also sanctioned under terrorism financing prevention laws.
The sanctions mean the bank accounts and assets of Chen and his affiliated companies are frozen, a ministry document said.
“We share the international responsibility toward regional security and we cannot tolerate any provocation to international security,” the ministry said in a statement.
Seoul last month said that Billions Bunker Group had chartered the ship Lighthouse Winmore, which was in November impounded by South Korean authorities after it allegedly transferred 600 tonnes of oil to a North Korean vessel.
Billions Bunker Group is incorporated in the Marshall Islands and cannot be traced directly to Chen, but Taiwanese authorities found him to be the sole shareholder of Bunker’s Taiwan Group — incorporated in the British Virgin Islands.
Local media said Chen sold oil products through “a Chinese middleman” and had told prosecutors he did not know they were bound for a North Korean vessel.
The US had asked the UN Security Council to blacklist 10 ships — including the Lighthouse Winmore — for violating sanctions against North Korea.
Taiwan announced in September last year that it was banning all trade activities with North Korea.
The combined effect of the monsoon, the outer rim of Typhoon Fengshen and a low-pressure system is expected to bring significant rainfall this week to various parts of the nation, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The heaviest rain is expected to occur today and tomorrow, with torrential rain expected in Keelung’s north coast, Yilan and the mountainous regions of Taipei and New Taipei City, the CWA said. Rivers could rise rapidly, and residents should stay away from riverbanks and avoid going to the mountains or engaging in water activities, it said. Scattered showers are expected today in central and
COOPERATION: Taiwan is aligning closely with US strategic objectives on various matters, including China’s rare earths restrictions, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Taiwan could deal with China’s tightened export controls on rare earth metals by turning to “urban mining,” a researcher said yesterday. Rare earth metals, which are used in semiconductors and other electronic components, could be recovered from industrial or electronic waste to reduce reliance on imports, National Cheng Kung University Department of Resources Engineering professor Lee Cheng-han (李政翰) said. Despite their name, rare earth elements are not actually rare — their abundance in the Earth’s crust is relatively high, but they are dispersed, making extraction and refining energy-intensive and environmentally damaging, he said, adding that many countries have opted to
SUPPLY CHAIN: Taiwan’s advantages in the drone industry include rapid production capacity that is independent of Chinese-made parts, the economic ministry said The Executive Yuan yesterday approved plans to invest NT$44.2 billion (US$1.44 billion) into domestic production of uncrewed aerial vehicles over the next six years, bringing Taiwan’s output value to more than NT$40 billion by 2030 and making the nation Asia’s democratic hub for the drone supply chain. The proposed budget has NT$33.8 billion in new allocations and NT$10.43 billion in existing funds, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said. Under the new development program, the public sector would purchase nearly 100,000 drones, of which 50,898 would be for civil and government use, while 48,750 would be for national defense, it said. The Ministry of
African swine fever was confirmed at a pig farm in Taichung, the Ministry of Agriculture said today, prompting a five-day nationwide ban on transporting and slaughtering pigs, and marking the loss of Taiwan’s status as the only Asian nation free of all three major swine diseases. The ministry held a news conference today confirming that the virus was detected at a farm in Wuci District (梧棲) yesterday evening. Authorities preemptively culled 195 pigs at the farm at about 3am and disinfected the entire site to prevent the disease from spreading, the ministry said. Authorities also set up a 3km-radius control zone
RSS