Kaohsiung District Prosecutors’ Office Charged 9 People for Exploiting and Abusing Foreign Crew on A Longline Fishing Boat, “Da Wang”, Against Human Trafficking Prevention Act

Director prosecutor Hon and prosecutor Liao, women and children protection unit in Kaohsiung District Prosecutors’ Office, commanded relating law enforcement agencies to investigate exploiting foreign fishing labors on a longline fishing boat, Da Wang, and indicted 9 people for allegation that crew beat migrant fishermen, forced them to work up to 20 hours a day, and made Muslim employees eat pork that violating their practice of religious believe.

The 9 people indicted by the prosecutors for violating human trafficking prevention law included two Taiwanese crew members of the fishing vessel "Da Wang", the agency of migrant workers, as well as two heads of a company that owns the boat. The migrant fishermen were Filipino and Indonesian and they were physically abused while fishing in the south Pacific. Prosecutors have determined that the captain and first officer actually forced and coercive to commit labor exploitation of migrant fishermen. One of the fishermen died onboard after being hit by the first mate, but as the boat was in Fiji at the time, the local court did not hold him accountable.

Upon reported of a suspicion of boat "Da-Wang" got involved into seagoing slavery and coerced labor in 2019 and 2021, Kaohsiung Prosecutors’ Office organized a special task force and started to probe the case. Though most of fishermen got off the boat at port Suva in Fiji, and requested mutual legal assistance was not responded by Fuji authorities, prosecutors Hon and Liao

Still made their efforts to inquired fishermen stayed in Taiwan and transferred to Taiwan. By analyzing seized amounts of fish, captain's email, on-site inspection, results of fishing boat equipment, fishing boat tracking map, fishermen’s paycheck as well as complaints provided by Greenpeace Foundation, prosecutors concluded that Taiwanese captain and first mate of the fishing vessel and 7 others violated human trafficking act , and coercion and forgery in criminal code.

Taiwan operates the world's largest deep-sea fishing fleet and wins her name as ‘longline fishery Kingdom’, with boats spending months -- and sometimes years -- crossing remote oceans to supply the seafood. Kaohsiung Prosecutors’ Office calls on all public continually pay attention to the fragile labor situation of foreign fishermen in the ocean, work together to find out whether there are unscrupulous persons using the system for labor

exploitation, strengthen the intensity of law enforcement, and jointly safeguard the human rights of foreign fishermen. We will also not allow offenders commit crimes by using longline fishing boats as a lawless islands where migrants had to work long hours in abusive conditions with low pay.