Taiwan can respond to assassination of unarmed fisherman by the Philippines

[Zero_wing]

The video tape is only two hours?? The chase was FOUR hours! the tape most likely contain only a near collision (or attempted "ramming") before the chase and not the end of the chase and the shooting. Why only two hours?

make up your mind you been bashing because there is no video now there is your still bashing! Man you need to just accept facts

 

[nastikan]

IMO Taiwan's aggressive posture and saber rattling is not helping the situation. They should give philipines a little time to come up with a response.

 

[Zero_wing]

IMO Taiwan's aggressive posture and saber rattling is not helping the situation. They should give philipines a little time to come up with a response.

Let them they are just being ignored anyway but we are investigating the matter we are not like them rushing things to gain political mileage with the people that MA really needs to go his the problem and the people of Taiwan needs to mature and be responsible they like their chinese brothers are making trouble everywhere they should stop doing illegal activities in the sea and respect the waters of their Neighbors

 

[WuMaoCleverbot]

Taiwanese probers watch video of PH Coast Guard's fatal encounter with fishing vessel
By: Marlene Alcaide, News5
May 28, 2013 11:38 AM

MANILA, Philippines - (UPDATE 5:30PM) Taiwanese investigators watched on Tuesday morning almost two hours of video taken by the Philippine Coast Guard and which captured the May 9 incident in the Balintang Channel, during which a Taiwanese fisherman was killed.

The investigators were accompanied by representatives of the Manila Economic and Cultural Office - the country’s de facto embassy to Taiwan - and Teco, its Taiwanese counterpart.

They declined to discuss what they saw.

Relatedly, the Taiwanese investigators also inspected the vessel of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources involved in the Balintang Channel incident.

The inspection conducted on MCS 3001, a 35-meter vessel made of fiberglass, lasted for almost one-and-a-half hours. It is docked at Pier 13 in Manila.

Commodore Eduardo Gongona, fleet commander of the Philippine Coast Guard, assisted the Taiwanese investigators. He said the foreign investigators inspected the inside area of the vessel and, with the use of a rubber boat, encircled the entire vessel.

They also took pictures of the proceedings.

He said the foreigners also inspected the damaged side of the vessel which could have been a result of the collision with the fishing boat of Taiwan.

Using a ruler, the Taiwanese investigators measured the armory of the BFAR vessel to determine whether the firearms used during the incident can be contained therein.

Even the siren used for warning an intruding boat was also utilized.

The Taiwanese investigators were accompanied by officials of the National Bureau of Investigation. After the inspection, the team went to the NBI headquarters on Taft Avenue, Manila.

Serious rift between neighbors

The death of the fisherman, whom the Coast Guard said was shot when his fishing boat allegedly tried to ram the BFAR vessel, has caused a serious rift between the Philippines and Taiwan.

On Monday the Taiwanese investigators conducted ballistics tests on the 17 firearms surrendered by the Coast Guard personnel in the incident

Taiwanese probers watch video of PH Coast Guard's fatal encounter with fishing vessel - InterAksyon.com

Dakdak ng dakdak ang mga Taiwanese nuong hindi pa nakikita ang video...ngayon na nakita nila ay hindi sila makapagsalita.

The Taiwanese gov't should apologize to the Philippine gov't and to the Filipino people. I can't understand why our gov't values its relationship to Taiwan so much. The Philippine gov't should release the video to the public so the world would know how these Taiwanese fishermen brazenly tried to ram our CG ship. Let the Taiwanese lose face.

 

[Malaya]

The video tape is only two hours?? The chase was FOUR hours! the tape most likely contain only a near collision (or attempted "ramming") before the chase and not the end of the chase and the shooting. Why only two hours?

This 2 hour video would establish quite a lot on what led to the death of your Taiwanese Fisherman. I hope objectivity based on facts will determine the cause and not just emotive delivery of justice. Both parties should respect the result of the investigation and move on.

 

[WuMaoCleverbot]

How Taiwanese fishermen are hurting Ivatans

From a report by Jorge Cariño, ABS-CBN News
Posted at 05/28/2013 9:45 PM | Updated as of 05/28/2013 9:45 PM

BATANES – Despite the tension over the killing of a Taiwanese fisherman off Batanes, Taiwanese fishing vessels continue to stray near Philippine waters.

Fishermen said their presence is hurting locals in Batanes.

Eddie Fainza went out fishing the whole of Tuesday morning but all he could show for his effort was a single dolphin fish.

Fainza shared there are supposed to be plenty of dolphin fish this time of the year, but because there are many Taiwanese fishing vessels in the area, fishing has become much harder.

“Hirap na hirap diyan sa siyam sa isang araw. Mabuti kung hook lang ang ginamit nila, eh lambat ‘yung gamit ng mga Taiwanese,” he said.

Over the weekend, several Taiwanese fishing vessels were spotted near the islands of Masanga and Mavudis.

Photos of the vessels were taken using a cellphone, and submitted by a fisherman to the police.

The local government admits that all they can do is document the presence of these vessels.

These are pictures they can use in case they file complaints.

Batanes Governor Vicente Gato himself admits they don't have the ability to fight off intruders.

He added that it is even easier to befriend the Taiwanese to avoid trouble.

“’Di naman kami papalaban sa mga kwan dito and definitely we are so far from mainland Luzon. As a matter of fact ah, mas malapit kami sa Taiwan kaysa Luzon,” he said.

There are Coast Guard personnel in Batanes, but they don’t even have boats on standby, leaving them helpless and unable to respond.

The people of Batanes said they may be tolerating the presence of Taiwanese vessels in the area but this doesn’t mean they can be bullied.

They said they are ready to defend themselves and their land when the need arises.

http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/focus/05/28/13/how-taiwanese-fishermen-are-hurting-ivatans

If the Taiwanese are rich, why are they stealing our fish??? Our gov't should not tolerate these Taiwanese thieves.

 

[Malaya]

The area is within Philippine territory. (Just use google maps just to have an idea of the location.)

Taiwan is acting irrational, like a cry baby. Doing tantrums if its wishes are ignored. It is not new that the Chinese/Taiwanese has been poaching regularly at our surrounding sea. We expressed apologies and we even gone extra mile for them. So enough! Their sanctions are directly irrelevant to the situation. The Philippine economy will continue to improve without Taiwan.

 

[Malaya]

double post

 

[Malaya]

19 intrusions by Taiwanese vessels into PH seas recorded since 2006—PCG
By Jerry E. Esplanada
Philippine Daily Inquirer
Tuesday, May 28th, 2013

MANILA, Philippines — At least 19 intrusions into northern Philippine waters by Taiwanese vessels suspected of illegal fishing have been recorded by the Philippine Coast Guard since 2006, a PCG official told the Philippine Daily Inquirer on Tuesday.

The official, who asked not to be named due to the sensitivity of the issue, also said that an undisclosed number of Taiwanese fishing vessels caught by the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) have remained in the custody of the agency after all these years.

One of the seized vessels has been fined P13 million by the BFAR while some of the fishermen have been charged in local courts, he said.

The BFAR operates 10 monitoring and surveillance vessels, most of them manned by PCG personnel.

The official noted that with the pullout of the BFAR surveillance ship 3001 from the Batanes group of islands, there had been no major Coast Guard presence in the area.

“Fishermen, mainly from Taiwan, are having a fiesta. Especially now, which is a fishing season,” he said.

The BFAR 3001, a fiber glass vessel, has a crew of 19, of whom 17 are PCG personnel.

Last year, the ship was one of several ships deployed by the government to the West Philippine Sea during the standoff between the Philippines and China over Scarborough Shoal.

Asked if the BFAR 3001 would be re-deployed to the north, Rear Admiral Rodolfo Isorena, PSG commandant, said he would await the outcome of the inquiry into the May 9 shooting of a Taiwanese boat off the Balintang Channel, which had led to the death of a Taiwanese fisherman.

He said the morale of the PCG personnel has sunk since the May 9 fatal shooting that stirred diplomatic tensions between the Philippines and Taiwan.

 

[Malaya]

So many existing threads/topics in this forum.

I hope the Mod should just merged all other threads related to this incident.

 

[Zero_wing]

Batanes Fisher folks Opposed signing Philippines-Taiwan fishing rights; Violation of “Archipelagic State” UNCLOS
at Wednesday, May 29, 2013

A Filipino Friendly Taiwanese fisherman; Mr Hung was shot inside the Philippine archipelagic baseline waters in the balintang Channel last May 9, 2013

Philippines could be sanction if will violate the article 51 with the Bahamas, Indonesia, Fiji, and Papua New Guinea

In the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) held in Jamaica last December 10, 1982; Five (5 ) Sovereign nations that includes the Bahamas, Indonesia, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, and the Philippines were approved and qualified as "Archipelagic States" which terms and conditions mentioned in the Part IV Archipelagic State: Article 51- Existing agreements, traditional fishing rights and existing submarine cables .. as said ..

" for the exercise of such rights and activities, including the nature, the extent and the areas to which they apply, shall, at the request of any of the States concerned, be regulated by bilateral agreements between them. Such rights shall not be transferred to or shared with third States or their nationals".

This article 51 of the UNLCOS in the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea held in Jamaica last December 10, 1982 means for the case in Southeast Asia and east Asian countries, only Indonesia and the Philippines could share its fishing rights as both are archipelagic states and "shall not shared with third States or their nationals"

The Philippines could not share its fish in between islands of the country to Taiwan as Taiwan is not an archipelagic State.

An Archipelagic State; In various conferences of the United Nations on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), Indonesia, the Philippines, Papua New Guinea, Fiji and the Bahamas are among the five sovereign nation that got the approval in the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) held in Jamaica last December 10, 1982 and qualified as Archipelagic States.

"Archipelagic States are states that composed of groups of islands forming a state as a single unit, with the islands and the waters within the baselines as internal waters. By this concept (Archipelagic doctrine), an archipelago shall be regarded as a single unit, so that the waters around, between, and connecting the islands of the archipelago, irrespective of their "breadth and dimensions", form part of the internal waters of the state, subject to its exclusive sovereignty"

Looking at the archipelagic baseline of the Philippines, the Philippines could not share its fish to Taiwan for the fishing ground in the Batanes group of Islands up to the Y'ami island and the Balintang Channel, where the recent shootout of a Taiwanese fishermen who is a very friendly to Filipinos happened,.

Fishing agreements that would not violate the UNCLOS provision article 51 would be only applicable in Bashi Channel beyond Y'Ami Island or in between Orchid Island and Y'Ami Island with coordinates of 21° 33'42" N and 121° 44'51" E.

Another case of shootout happened to a wandering Taiwanese fishermen in 2006 happened in Batanes Group of Islands shore which 2 Philippine police men were listed by Taiwan as "wanted" after the shootout inside the Philippine Archipelagic Baseline.

Taiwan's fishing agreement would be limited only outside the Philippine Archipelagic baseline as it would jeopardize the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) held in Jamaica last December 10, 1982 it if would allow Taiwan to fish inside the Philippine archipelagic baseline.

Taiwan is not an archipelagic state which UN convention article 51 is not applicable to them.

Filipinos Opposed the Fishing Agreement between the Philippines and Taiwan inside Philippine Archipelagic baseline

As reported in the BBC News Asia, for generations, Quirino Gabotero Jr's family and the estimated 15,000 people in the Philippines' northernmost Batanes Islands have been relying on the sea for a living. But in recent decades, they have seen their food source decline.

The same body of water around the islands is also claimed by neighboring Taiwan as its exclusive economic zone. Taiwanese fishermen are able to catch more fish with their bigger boats and more sophisticated fishing methods.

They have even depleted the stock of flying fish - something they use as bait, but is staple food for Batanes residents, said Mr. Gabotero.

"During the times when we don't see them, we get 1,000 or 2,000 flying fish in one catch. When they're around, we don't catch so many, perhaps only 100," said Mr. Gabotero.

Unlike Taiwanese fishermen, many of the Philippines 1.6 million fisher folk are not commercial fishermen, and nearly half of them are considered poor, according to the government.

"Our fishermen catch just enough to feed their family, but nothing more. They can barely build their house, or send their children to school. Some of them are so poor they have to work as migrant workers on the Taiwanese fishing boats to fish in their own waters," said Mr. Gabotero.

Tensions over this unequal ability to tap the rich marine resources of the South China Sea and West Philippine Sea have been brewing for years.

They exploded in a diplomatic row between Taiwan and the Philippines this month when 65-year-old Taiwanese fisherman Hung Shih-cheng was shot dead after Philippines coast guard opened fire on his boat while he was fishing in the overlapping waters of the two sides' exclusive economic zones.

Since then, both Taipei and Manila have sent naval vessels to disputed parts of the South China Sea and West Philippine Sea.

This incident highlights how unresolved disputes in the resource-rich South China Sea and West Philippine Sea could potentially threaten good relations among countries in the region, and even regional stability.

"We are against signing a fisheries agreement because that means we are giving our resources to them without getting our fair share" Quirino Gabotero, Filipino fisherman"

'No shelter'

Besides Taiwan and the Philippines, several countries, including China, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei claim part or all of the sea - believed to be rich in oil and natural gas deposits, besides fish stocks.

While attention has been focused on the Philippines-Taiwan dispute, other countries are also involved in fishing and territorial disputes in the sea. Taiwan's boats also have been detained by Indonesia and Vietnam, while the Philippines regularly deal with "poachers" from China, Malaysia and Vietnam.

"The most problematic is China, not really Taiwan, because they have made a map which includes our territorial waters," said Jonathan Bickson, chief of the captured fisheries division in the Philippines' Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources.

"One country even sends maritime patrol vessels. When our fishermen go to these fishing grounds, they even drive them away, even though these are our fishing grounds, especially Scarborough Shoal in western Philippines," he said.

"So our fishermen now cannot even make shelter in Scarborough when there's rough seas or when there are typhoons. The situation has gotten worse in recent years."

China insists the shoal is historically Chinese territory.

In the case of the body of water separating Taiwan and the Philippines, Philippine fishermen have been notifying their coast guard when they spot Taiwanese boats. That has led to a rise in fines and arrests of Taiwanese fishermen.

Taiwan's Fisheries Agency estimates that in the past three decades, there have been 108 incidents of Taiwan's fishing boats being stopped, fined or confiscated or crews detained for six months to a year by Filipino authorities.

Fines imposed on the crews have ranged from $50,000 (£33,000) to $60,000, according to the agency. The actual numbers are believed to be higher because some cases are settled without being reported to Taiwan's authorities.

'Don't dare to sleep'

Taiwanese fishermen also see themselves as victims. For generations, they have lived off the sea, but they say each time they head out to what they consider as their fishing grounds, they face risks.

"The Philippines consider the area their waters, so they've confiscated our boats, fined us and they've opened fire in the past. This was not the first time. It's happened many times before," said Tsai Bao-hsin, director of Taiwan's Liouciou District Fisheries Association, whose fishermen regularly fish in the area.

At least one other Taiwanese fisherman was shot dead a few years ago. More than 1,000 boats have been confiscated, according to Mr. Tsai.

When confronted, many of the fishermen have to make the split-second decision of whether to stop and pay a huge fine, risk having their boat confiscated and being jailed, or try to get away.

Investigators from both sides are probing the shooting of Mr.. Hung, but his son - who was onboard at the time - has said the boat was sprayed with bullets when they tried to get away to avoid paying a fine they didn't think they should pay because they were fishing in waters Taiwan considers its territory.

Despite the dangers, more than half of Taiwan's estimated 350,000 fishermen sail to the South China Sea and West Philippine Sea. That's because it's a good place to catch the very valuable tuna - of which Taiwan is one of the biggest producers in the world.

But the killing of Mr. Hung is considered by the Taiwanese as the last straw. Taiwan's fishermen are demanding their government negotiate an agreement with the Philippines on fishing rights to stop the harassment they say they regularly face and to prevent similar incidents from happening again.

"Sometimes we don't even dare to sleep at night when we are out at sea," said Hung Sheng-huei, who had fished since the age of 16 but gave it up after he was arrested by the Philippines in 2010 and spent three months in a crowded jail cell.

"When they stopped us at sea, they all had guns. They demanded I pay $120,000. It's like we were an ATM machine. I offered to wire them the money, but they wanted cash. I didn't have it."

Mr. Hung said he ended up turning over his boat to them to get out of jail. He now works odd jobs for other fishermen and lives on his savings.

"It's a big impact on my family. We depend on the sea for a living," said Mr. Hung, who added that he will only return to sea if the two sides reach a fishing agreement.

But most Batanes fishermen are opposed to the signing of such an agreement, even though Manila has expressed interest in holding talks at some point.

"We believe the Batanes territory, including the waters within it from the north to south, the Philippine government owns that," Mr. Gabotero said. "We are against signing a fisheries agreement because that means we are giving our resources to them without getting our fair share."

It remains to be seen whether the two sides can find a mutually beneficial and acceptable way of resolving this difficult dispute. If they do, it could set an example for other countries with claims to these waters.

With report from BBC News Asia

 

[p3avi8tor69]

Don't worry Zero_wing, Imperial Manila couldn't give a rat's arse to simple fisher folks and the destitute, Imperial Manila only caters to the Chinese taipans, Spanish oligarchs and elite and corrupt Pinoys.

 

[Zero_wing]

Don't worry Zero_wing, Imperial Manila couldn't give a rat's arse to simple fisher folks and the destitute, Imperial Manila only caters to the Chinese taipans, Spanish oligarchs and elite and corrupt Pinoys.

Wow you sound like real moron when you say that stop copying those wasteful excuse for humans makes you sound like dumb@$$

 

[sdjd2013]

The area is within Philippine territory. (Just use google maps just to have an idea of the location.)

Taiwan is acting irrational, like a cry baby. Doing tantrums if its wishes are ignored. It is not new that the Chinese/Taiwanese has been poaching regularly at our surrounding sea. We expressed apologies and we even gone extra mile for them. So enough! Their sanctions are directly irrelevant to the situation. The Philippine economy will continue to improve without Taiwan.

I don't know if people like you are just devoid of cognizance, or are you purposely leaving out details to distort the truth? Are saying because the incident happened south of Bataanes and therefore it is in PH territory? Where is the EEZ line on your map? Let me post a real map for you.

 

[sdjd2013]

Let's Tell the World the Brutality and Callousness of Philippine Government

PH has ignored Taiwan's proposed temporary EEZ line (the red line with the rectangular shape carved out for the Bataanes isles) made to avoid military conflicts for the last 20 years. By staying silent to Taiwan's own enforcement of its proposed EEZ line, PH has acquiesced to the proposal. The incident happened in the overlapping areas just south of the red EEZ line, but it is still within the international 200 nautical miles zone. If you guys can't get along with your neighbors in a peaceful manner, then I'd say fu ck you all and bomb the **** out of manila, and Taiwan should join with China to fu ck up the Americans too if they try to interfere.