The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday lauded a Manila court’s conviction of eight members of a Philippine Coast Guard vessel for their killing of a Taiwanese fisher aboard the Kuang Ta Hsing No. 28 in 2013.
On May 9, 2013, 65-year-old fisher Hung Shih-cheng (洪石成) was shot to death by Philippine Coast Guards officers in the Balingtang Channel, where the exclusive economic zones of Taiwan and the Philippines overlap.
The killing brought attention to the long-term conflict over fishing rights in the area, sparking a diplomatic row between Taiwan and the Philippines.
Photo: Wu Cheng-feng, Taipei Times
The Philippine Government in August 2013 released a report on the incident and the suspects were prosecuted by the Philippine Department of Justice in March 2014.
After more than six years, a regional court in Manila yesterday handed down prison terms of eight to 14 years to the eight coast guard officials, the ministry said.
The court also ordered each officer to pay Hung’s heirs 50,000 Philippine pesos (US$958.86) in civil indemnity and another 50,000 in moral damages, the Manila Bulletin reported.
The court said that the “prosecution has clearly established the intent to kill on the part of the accused as shown by their act of shooting the Kuang Ta Hsing No. 28 vessel with the use of high-velocity firearms while they were chasing it.”
A lawyer for the accused said that they would appeal the sentences, the report said.
The ministry said that the ruling realizes judicial justice, even though it can be appealed.
Philippine prosecutors visited Taiwan several times to gather evidence, while the ministry helped Hung’s family, witnesses and experts testify before the court in Manila, it said.
The ministry said that it would monitor any developments in the case, while Taiwan and the Philippines would continue to deepen their collaborations based on mutual trust.
The ruling is unsatisfying, but acceptable, said Hung Tzu-chien (洪慈綪), the daughter of the victim.
If the accused had been tried in Taiwan, they would have faced harsher penalties and fines, she said.
Many other Pingtung County-based fishers had encountered similar situations without being able to bring the perpetrators to justice, she said.
The family of the victim does not care about the prison terms and compensation, but instead hopes that the government would guarantee other fishers’ safety by improving its policies, she added.
The Manila Economic and Cultural Office in Taipei said in a statement that it deeply regretted the incident.
“We hope that both parties would eventually overcome the emotional strain that this regretful incident brought about more than six years ago and that our peoples can move toward strengthening our bonds of friendship,” the office said.
Additional reporting by CNA
AGING: As of last month, people aged 65 or older accounted for 20.06 percent of the total population and the number of couples who got married fell by 18,685 from 2024 Taiwan has surpassed South Korea as the country least willing to have children, with an annual crude birthrate of 4.62 per 1,000 people, Ministry of the Interior data showed yesterday. The nation was previously ranked the second-lowest country in terms of total fertility rate, or the average number of children a woman has in her lifetime. However, South Korea’s fertility rate began to recover from 2023, with total fertility rate rising from 0.72 and estimated to reach 0.82 to 0.85 by last year, and the crude birthrate projected at 6.7 per 1,000 people. Japan’s crude birthrate was projected to fall below six,
US President Donald Trump in an interview with the New York Times published on Thursday said that “it’s up to” Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) what China does on Taiwan, but that he would be “very unhappy” with a change in the “status quo.” “He [Xi] considers it to be a part of China, and that’s up to him what he’s going to be doing, but I’ve expressed to him that I would be very unhappy if he did that, and I don’t think he’ll do that. I hope he doesn’t do that,” Trump said. Trump made the comments in the context
SELF-DEFENSE: Tokyo has accelerated its spending goal and its defense minister said the nation needs to discuss whether it should develop nuclear-powered submarines China is ramping up objections to what it sees as Japan’s desire to acquire nuclear weapons, despite Tokyo’s longstanding renunciation of such arms, deepening another fissure in the two neighbors’ increasingly tense ties. In what appears to be a concerted effort, China’s foreign and defense ministries issued statements on Thursday condemning alleged remilitarism efforts by Tokyo. The remarks came as two of the country’s top think tanks jointly issued a 29-page report framing actions by “right-wing forces” in Japan as posing a “serious threat” to world peace. While that report did not define “right-wing forces,” the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs was
PREPAREDNESS: Given the difficulty of importing ammunition during wartime, the Ministry of National Defense said it would prioritize ‘coproduction’ partnerships A newly formed unit of the Marine Corps tasked with land-based security operations has recently replaced its aging, domestically produced rifles with more advanced, US-made M4A1 rifles, a source said yesterday. The unnamed source familiar with the matter said the First Security Battalion of the Marine Corps’ Air Defense and Base Guard Group has replaced its older T65K2 rifles, which have been in service since the late 1980s, with the newly received M4A1s. The source did not say exactly when the upgrade took place or how many M4A1s were issued to the battalion. The confirmation came after Chinese-language media reported
RSS