US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) seized the catch of a Taiwanese fishing vessel that was flying a “flag of convenience” and using forced labor, the agency said on Friday.
The CBP said in a statement that the Vanuatu-flagged vessel Da Wang (大旺) is owned and operated by the Taiwanese firm Yong Feng Fishery.
The company is one of two recently found by the CBP suspected of using forced labor. The other is a Malaysian company, Sime Darby Plantation Berhad (Sime Darby), whose palm oil and related merchandise was also seized.
“CBP’s investigations found evidence of all 11 of the International Labour Organization’s forced labor indicators on the Da Wang vessel and Sime Darby Plantation’s palm oil plantations,” the statement said.
“CBP determined that Sime Darby and [Yong Feng] use forced labor in their operations, and that both companies’ goods are being, or are likely to be, imported into the United States,” the CBP said.
The CBP in July 2020 issued a Withhold Release Order against seafood caught with what it said was reasonable suspicion of forced labor, physical violence, debt bondage, withholding of wages, and abusive living conditions on the Da Wang.
A Greenpeace Southeast Asia report titled Seabound: The Journey to Modern Slavery on the High Seas in May last year said that the Da Wang was involved in forced labor.
The National Immigration Agency (NIA) also said that a migrant worker on the Da Wang was a victim of a human trafficking scheme.
The Control Yuan in May called on the Cabinet and several government agencies, including the NIA, Ocean Affairs Council and the Fisheries Agency, to address human rights abuses on Taiwanese fishing vessels flying flags of convenience.
Flying such flags is a common practice in which merchant ship owners register their vessels in a country other than their own to reduce costs, avoid taxes and bypass legal requirements that protect the wages and working conditions of their crews.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas