Members of Hualien’s Truku community rallied outside the Hualien County Police Bureau in Hualien City on Nov. 7 to protest last month’s arrest of Truku hunters in Taroko National Park and the confiscation of their firearms and haul of game during the Truku Thanksgiving Day feast.
Dowmung Tribal Council Chairman Masaw (鍾德光), who was one of the hunters arrested last month, said the protesters demand that police respect their right to hunt and call on the government to abolish special jurisdiction and police checkpoints in restricted mountain areas, which he called “toxic residue from the Martial Law era.”
Chung said that he and three others were arrested in Taroko National Park (太魯閣國家公園) on Oct. 15 when returning from a legal hunt conducted on behalf of the Sioulin Township (秀林) Truku community in Hualien’s Tongmen Village (銅門) as part of ritual celebrations for their Thanksgiving Day festival.
Photo: Hua Meng-ching, Taipei Times
Although the hunting party had obtained a valid 12-day license on Oct. 3, the hunters were arrested and their weapons and game were confiscated by police on the grounds that two animals they hunted and killed, a Reeves’ muntjac and a Formosan sambar, were on the endangered species list, Chung said.
Five of their firearms, including a “keepsake from a [hunter’s] deceased grandfather,” were confiscated, as well as the meat from their kills — 14 flying squirrels and the two endangered animals — leaving what the Truku community considered as gifts to their ancestral spirits to “rot in the sun,” he said.
“Why is hunting [protected] monkeys permitted, but hunting muntjacs and sambar forbidden?” Chung asked, adding that “the government does not see Aborigines as human beings,” a possible reference to a now infamous statement made in 2007 by then-presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) to a gathering of Aboriginal peoples: “I see you as human beings… [Therefore] you have to play by our rules.”
A dozen police officers armed with batons prevented the protesters from entering the Hualien County Police Bureau compound to deliver a petition.
“Do they think we are rioters?” an unnamed demonstrator asked.
“If Ma can visit [Chinese President] Xi [Jinping, 習近平] in Singapore, why is it so hard for Aboriginal citizens to visit a police commissioner?” another unnamed protester asked.
After Deputy Commissioner Yang Kuo-Hsiang (楊國祥) met with the protesters outside and accepted their petition, they voluntarily returned home.
“The police continue to arrest indigenous hunters for alleged violations of the Wildlife Conservation Act (野生動物保育法),” said Chen Tsai-yi (陳采邑), an attorney with the Legal Aid Foundation’s Working Group on Indigenous Peoples’ Legal Affairs.
“However, articles in both the Wildlife Conservation Act and the Indigenous Peoples Basic Act (原住民族基本法) explicitly allow ‘the hunting and killing of wildlife’ for the ‘traditional, cultural or ritual’ needs of indigenous peoples,” she said.
“There is nothing wrong with hunting by Aboriginal communities if they follow their traditions, and the endangered species list needs to be updated more regularly,” said Wu Hsing-ju (吳幸如), a life science doctoral candidate at National Taiwan Normal University and a researcher of wild boars in Taiwan.
“Relevant laws have long since been amended, but law enforcement officers on the front lines often neglect the needs of Aboriginal communities and exceed their authority. It is not good that unnecessary conflicts have been created,” Council of Indigenous Peoples Deputy Minister Tunkan Tunsikian said.
Hualien County Bureau of Agriculture Director-General Lo Wen-lung (羅文龍) said the bureau conditionally allows the killing of Formosan rock macaques “in self-defense” when the animals eat produce from farms or orchards, which is not the same as giving legal permission to hunt them.
When asked for comment, Hualien County Forestry Bureau section chief Kuan Li-hao (管立豪) said that while laws and regulations do permit Aboriginal peoples to hunt, approval for the species and numbers they are allowed to kill still “depends on circumstances,” and Aboriginal hunters should keep to “the restrictions stipulated by their hunting permits.”
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
DEADLOCK: As the commission is unable to forum a quorum to review license renewal applications, the channel operators are not at fault and can air past their license date The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday said that the Public Television Service (PTS) and 36 other television and radio broadcasters could continue airing, despite the commission’s inability to meet a quorum to review their license renewal applications. The licenses of PTS and the other channels are set to expire between this month and June. The National Communications Commission Organization Act (國家通訊傳播委員會組織法) stipulates that the commission must meet the mandated quorum of four to hold a valid meeting. The seven-member commission currently has only three commissioners. “We have informed the channel operators of the progress we have made in reviewing their license renewal applications, and
RSS