The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) yesterday announced that it had dispatched ships to intercept Chinese dredging vessels operating in the nation’s territorial waters near Penghu and detained 10 crew members, who were transported to Kaohsiung.
A coast guard patrol discovered more than 20 dredging vessels in an area known as the Formosa Banks, 46 nautical miles (85km) southwest of Penghu County’s Cimei islet (七美) at about 5am on Wednesday.
The agency responded by dispatching two patrol boats, the 3,000-tonne Kaohsiung and the 500-tonne Penghu, along with two frigates, to intercept the Chinese vessels, while an airborne observation unit was used to monitor their location.
Photo courtesy of the Coast Guard Administration
The Kaohsiung and the Penghu cornered a 7,539-tonne Chinese vessel that was mining sand, and the Penghu deployed a water cannon against it, the coast guard said.
The two boats closed in on the intruder and 17 coast guard personnel were able to board it, the agency said.
The 10 member crew aboard the Chinese vessel, including the captain, were detained and it was escorted to Kaohsiung’s Singda Harbor (興達港), the agency said.
Photo courtesy of the Coast Guard Administration
The Chinese ship was estimated to have mined more than 400 tonnes of sand, which was returned from where it was taken, it said.
The Formosa Banks have an abundance of marine life, but in recent years Chinese dredging vessels have frequently mined sand in the area, marring the terrain and ecology, it said.
In other developments, Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) yesterday approved a draft ocean white paper, which includes the goal of defending the nation’s maritime sovereignty.
The draft has as an overarching theme to build a “sustainable, secure and prosperous” ocean nation, and seeks to facilitate international collaborations to uphold regional security through law enforcement at sea, conserve the marine ecology, establish goals for the development of ocean industries, encourage people to get close to the sea to populate the concept of an ocean nation, and to support oceanic research, the Ocean Affairs Council said.
The Ocean Basic Act (海洋基本法), passed in November last year, required the government to promulgate an ocean policy white paper within a year, the council said.
The white paper was drafted in the spirit of the Executive Yuan’s “paying tribute to the mountains” policy, which opened 77 mountain trails that had previously been off limits to the public, in the hopes of encouraging people to “know, get close to and sail” the sea, Su said.
Every nation must explore the sea if it wants to be prosperous, he said.
Taiwan, which has more than 2,000km of shoreline, should make good use of its geography, he said.
FEW REMAIN: Conservationists tried to stop the demolition, but to no avail, and the owner cannot be fined, as the structure was not listed as a historical building One of the few remaining Japanese colonial-era granaries in Taiwan was dismantled by its owner on Friday, prompting outrage from conservationists. The granary, which was at No. 16, Lane 11, Hangzhou S Rd Sec 1 in Taipei, belonged to Taiwan Takushoku Corp during the colonial era, conservationist Chang Wan-lin (張琬琳) said, adding that she and others had been collecting information to reapply to have the building protected as a historical structure. During the colonial era, the granary served the area from Monga (艋舺) to what is now Songshan District (松山) in the north, she said. “Back then the eastern part
SEEING THE POSITIVE: A majority of respondents in Taiwan said that they favored Trump because they think Taiwan-US ties would improve with him Among eight Asia-Pacific countries and regions, only Taiwan prefers US President Donald Trump over his challenger, former US vice president Joe Biden, in the upcoming US presidential election, a survey released on Thursday showed. According to the poll published by UK-based market research firm YouGov, 42 percent of Taiwanese favor Trump in the Nov. 3 election, while 30 percent back Biden and 28 percent have no opinion. In contrast, respondents in Malaysia favor Biden over Trump 62 percent to 9 percent, and in Singapore by 66 percent to 12 percent, the survey showed. Biden also led Trump in Australia (60 percent to 21
TROUBLEMAKER: The missiles, capable of striking up to 2,000km away, would likely be used to deter other nations from coming to Taiwan’s aid, a legislator said The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has reportedly deployed advanced hypersonic missiles along China’s southeast coast, which Taiwan’s missile defense system might have difficulty intercepting, an analyst said yesterday. Citing an unnamed military source, the South China Morning Post said that the missile bases on the coasts of China’s Fujian and Zhejiang provinces have been upgraded and are stocked with DF-17 missiles, equipped with hypersonic glide vehicles. “The DF-17 hypersonic missile will gradually replace the old DF-11s and DF-15s that were deployed in the southeast region for decades,” said the source, who requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic. “The
Hong Kong air traffic controllers turning away a Taiwanese flight last week might have been China’s first move in a broader campaign to restrict Taiwan’s air access to its outlying islands, a retired air force general said on Saturday. The government needs to establish a response plan in the event that aircraft are denied entry to Flight Information Regions (FIRs) en route to Kinmen and Matsu, among others islands, retired lieutenant general Chang Yen-ting (張延廷) said. The Ministry of National Defense, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of the Interior, as well as the Straits Exchange Foundation and Mainland Affairs Council, must
RSS