Coast Guard Administration (CGA) officials yesterday said they have arrested 31 foreigners in a suspected human-trafficking operation that resulted in two drowning deaths.
CGA units and local police cooperated in the arrest of 15 foreigners near the coastal village of Nantian (南田) in Taitung County’s Daren Township (達仁).
“All 15 foreigners arrested yesterday [Monday] were Vietnamese, except for one woman from China. We believe they are all part of the same human-trafficking ring operated by a Taiwanese ship, which tried to land them along the Taitung coast so they could enter the country illegally,” said Li chih-hao (李智豪), a section chief at the agency’s Eastern Coastal Patrol Office.
Photo: copied by Chen Hsien-i, Taipei Times
The agency said it picked up a speedboat heading toward Taitung on radar at about 2am on Monday, and a patrol team was dispatched to investigate.
The speedboat headed to a spot about 2 nautical miles (3.7km) from the shore of Nantian Village, where a Taiwanese man told the foreigners to get into a rubber dinghy and to row the rest of the way to the shore, the agency said.
The dinghy capsized in high waves and six occupants fell into the water. The CGA patrol tried to rescue two of those who fell into the water — a Vietnamese man and woman — and rushed them to hospital, but the two were later pronounced dead.
The other four — two Vietnamese women, a Vietnamese man and a Taiwanese man — made it to land, where they were arrested by coast guard agents.
The Taiwanese man is likely a crew member of the Kaohsiung-registered Jin Chun Cai (金春財), which is suspected of being engaged in human trafficking, the agency said.
The agency said it boarded the vessel, where they found 16 Vietnamese nationals and six Taiwanese crew members.
It said that all the foreign nationals and Taiwanese crew have been detained for questioning, while public prosecutors in Taitung and Kaohsiung conduct an investigation.
CGA units in Kaohsiung yesterday confirmed they had arrested the captain of the Jin Chun Cai, a 64-year-old man surnamed Wang (王), and five crew — three Taiwanese and two foreign workers.
When questioned, Wang said he had nothing to do with the two drowning deaths.
However, agency officials said Wang has a reputation as a “snakehead” among local fishermen and has allegedly colluded with Chinese to smuggle foreigners into Taiwan in the past.
Dawu Police Precinct spokesman Tsai Ching-liang (蔡清良) said the Vietnamese intended to work in Taiwan illegally, because they wanted to avoid paying high labor broker fees.
Many foreign recruitment companies make high profits by charging additional fees on top of the government-sanctioned fees.
Migrant workers have complained of having to pay as much as their entire year’s salary to labor brokers.
In August last year, the Ministry of Labor raised the minimum monthly wage for migrant workers from NT$21,009 to NT$22,000, or NT$264,000 a year.
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
US President Donald Trump yesterday announced sweeping "reciprocal tariffs" on US trading partners, including a 32 percent tax on goods from Taiwan that is set to take effect on Wednesday. At a Rose Garden event, Trump declared a 10 percent baseline tax on imports from all countries, with the White House saying it would take effect on Saturday. Countries with larger trade surpluses with the US would face higher duties beginning on Wednesday, including Taiwan (32 percent), China (34 percent), Japan (24 percent), South Korea (25 percent), Vietnam (46 percent) and Thailand (36 percent). Canada and Mexico, the two largest US trading
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
RSS