Human rights groups yesterday staged a demonstration in front of the headquarters of Ve Wong Corp — a well-known food manufacturer that produces instant noodles, sauces and snacks — in Taipei, protesting against the alleged seizure of farmland in Cambodia by two of the company’s joint ventures.
“The forced seizure of farmland in Cambodia’s Koh Kong Province by Koh Kong Sugar Co Ltd and Koh Kong Plantation Co Ltd is a very well-known case among human rights activists in Southeast Asia,” said Roxanna Chen (陳思穎), a protester who used to work at a human rights organization based in Thailand. “After looking deeper into the case, I realized that a Taiwanese firm was one of the major investors in the two companies and that’s why I think we should take some actions here in Taiwan.”
According to Chen, Ve Wong owns a 30 percent stake in each of the companies operating in Cambodia, with the remainder of both fims owned by the Thailand-based Khon Kaen Sugar Co and Cambodian member of parliament, Ly Yong Phat.
Photo: Chu Pei-hsiung, Taipei Times
Since 2006, Koh Kong Sugar has seized 9,600 hectares of farmland and Koh Kong Plantation took 9,400 hectares to build a sugarcane plantation and a sugar processing plant, Chen said.
Several Cambodian farmers were killed or injured by security personnel dispatched by the companies as they tried to protest the seizure of their farmland, she added.
“I don’t know the law, but I want to say that it’s fine for Ve Wong to make money, but they have no right to do so by hurting others and depriving farmers of their rights,” said Ly Vouch Hang, a Cambodian immigrant who represented the TransAsia Sisters Association Taiwan at the protest.
Taiwan Association for Human Rights’ Policy director Shih Yi-hsiang (施逸翔) said that as a signatory of the UN’s International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and its International Covenant on Economic, Cultural, and Social Rights, “the government should make sure that all businesses follow the principles laid out in the two covenants, whether operating in Taiwan or abroad.”
In response to the protest, Ve Wong Corp issued a statement saying that while the company holds a 30 percent stake in each of the companies, “our Thai partners are in charge of the daily operations of the companies and have never informed us about what the human rights groups have stated.”
China has reserved offshore airspace in the Yellow Sea and East China Sea from March 27 to May 6, issuing alerts usually used to warn of military exercises, although no such exercises have been announced, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported yesterday. Reserving such a large area for 40 days without explanation is an “unusual step,” as military exercises normally only last a few days, the paper said. These alerts, known as Notice to Air Missions (Notams), “are intended to inform pilots and aviation authorities of temporary airspace hazards or restrictions,” the article said. The airspace reserved in the alert is
NAMING SPAT: The foreign ministry called on Denmark to propose an acceptable solution to the erroneous nationality used for Taiwanese on residence permits Taiwan has revoked some privileges for Danish diplomatic staff over a Danish permit that lists “Taiwan” as “China,” Eric Huang (黃鈞耀), head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Department of European Affairs, told a news conference in Taipei yesterday. Reporters asked Huang whether the Danish government had responded to the ministry’s request that it correct the nationality on Danish residence permits of Taiwanese, which has been listed as “China” since 2024. Taiwan’s representative office in Denmark continues to communicate with the Danish government, and the ministry has revoked some privileges previously granted to Danish representatives in Taiwan and would continue to review
More than 6,000 Taiwanese students have participated in exchange programs in China over the past two years, despite the Mainland Affairs Council’s (MAC) “orange light” travel advisory, government records showed. The MAC’s publicly available registry showed that Taiwanese college and university students who went on exchange programs across the Strait numbered 3,592 and 2,966 people respectively. The National Immigration Agency data revealed that 2,296 and 2,551 Chinese students visited Taiwan for study in the same two years. A review of the Web sites of publicly-run universities and colleges showed that Taiwanese higher education institutions continued to recruit students for Chinese educational programs without
China has reserved offshore airspace over the Yellow Sea and East China Sea from March 27 to May 6, issuing alerts that are usually used to warn of military exercises, although no such exercises have been announced, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on Sunday. Reserving such a large area for 40 days without explanation is an “unusual step,” as military exercises normally only last a few days, the paper said. The alerts, known as notice to air missions (NOTAMs), “are intended to inform pilots and aviation authorities of temporary airspace hazards or restrictions,” the article said. The airspace reserved in the alert
RSS