Indonesia Sinks 10 Illegal Fishing Vessels

Jakarta Globe, Alin Almanar, December 31, 2015

Susi Pudjiastuti, the minister for maritime affairs and fisheries, visits impounded
 illegal foreign fishing vessels in Kubu Raya district, West Kalimantan. (Antara
Photo/Jessica Helena Wuysang)

Jakarta. Indonesian authorities on Thursday simultaneously sank ten foreign and local fishing boats caught operating illegally in the archipelago's vast waters, in the government's latest move in its war on illegal fishing.

Among the foreign vessels destroyed that day, two were Philippine-flagged boats carrying 16 and three Filipino fishermen respectively; another two hailed from Malaysia, each with a crew of 22 consisting of Malaysian and Myanmar nationals.

The latter two were caught with a total of 19 tons of fish.

The remaining were Indonesian fishing boats that had employed a crew of 44 Filipinos combined.

The vessels were sunk in four separate locations: six in the waters of Tahuna district off the coast of North Sulawesi; two in Tarakan, North Kalimantan; one in Belawan, North Sumatra; and another in Ranai, Riau.

"We will continue to take firm actions against boats caught fishing illegally in Indonesian waters as per the president's instructions," said First Adm. M. Zainudin, spokesman for the Indonesian Navy.

Upon taking office last October, President Joko Widodo instructed authorities to take drastic measures in tackling illegal and unreported fishing, which lead to dozens of ships from neighboring countries being destroyed.

According to government estimates, illegal fishing is costing the state some Rp 300 trillion ($21.68 billion) annually.

Thai crackdown on rogue fishing as fears grow over EU ban

Yahoo – AFP, Preeti Jha, 1 July 2015

Migrant workers sort fish in a port in Mahachai on the outskirts of Bangkok (AFP

Photo/Nicolas Asfouri)

Mahachai (Thailand) (AFP) - A belated Thai clampdown on illegal fishing is forcing unlicensed vessels ashore, threatening to paralyse a key industry as the kingdom desperately tries to avoid a European Union ban on exports worth $1 billion a year.

Barrels of fish packed in ice are usually rolled off boats at a bustling port in Samut Sakhon, a coastal province near Bangkok, by Myanmar and Cambodia migrant workers who prop up the world's third largest seafood producer.

A migrant worker sits on a fishing boat

 in a port in Mahachai on the outskirts of

Bangkok (AFP Photo/Nicolas Asfouri)

But many will sit idle from Wednesday, say their Thai employers, who have failed to obtain necessary fishing permits under a raft of new government rules aimed at cleaning up the shadowy industry.

Next to buckets of red snapper destined to become fish balls for the local market and fishmeal to rear shrimp marked for Europe, a Thai vessel owner says there are "too many rules and too little time".

"We will have to keep paying bills with no income," said the worried 59-year-old, who withheld his name, as he prepares to cease operations until he can meet the conditions for a new permit.

The Wednesday deadline to register boats with authorities and acquire permits under revised standards, including installing equipment such as tracking devices, comes after the European Union threatened to ban fish imports from the kingdom unless it combats illegal fishing.

In April Brussels issued Thailand with a "yellow card" for inadequate fisheries monitoring, controls and punishment, warning that a "red card" and eventual import ban would follow if it failed to improve within six months.

The spectre of losing $1 billion in European sales is a shortfall the ruling military can ill-afford in an already sluggish economy.

Thailand saw only 0.3 percent growth in the first quarter and exports have been slowing in part, says the World Bank, due to an erosion in competitiveness.

Aphisit Techanitisawad, president of The Thai Overseas Fisheries Association, estimates around 3,000 fishing vessels nationwide will forsake the seas from Wednesday.

A worker checks canned fish at the 

Anusorn Group factory in Tasai, on the

 outskirts of Bangkok (AFP Photo/

Nicolas Asfouri)

"About 80 percent of all the fishermen, they're coming back to shore" to seek permits, he told AFP at his fisheries factory in Samut Sakhon.

Thailand's image battered

A recent shortage in fresh fish has already seen his workers stop processing crab sticks for French export, instead focussing on canning sardines and mackerel from frozen supplies for the Myanmar and Cambodian markets.

A labour ministry spokeswoman said around 80,000 migrants were working in Thai fisheries since the deadline for compulsory migrant registrations closed Tuesday.

Aphisit thinks the government could have imposed a more lenient timeframe for changes.

But premier Prayut Chan-O-Cha has remained adamant the industry has been left unchecked for too long.

"Don't put any more pressure on government," he said when asked about rising anger within the fishing industry.

"If we don't pass these measures a 200 billion baht ($6 billion) industry could be wiped out so everybody should cooperate," he said.

Thailand's image has been battered in recent years by a series of fishing abuse allegations from prominent rights groups of ships using slave and child labour as well as trafficking victims.

Migrant workers at work in a port in 

Mahachai, on the outskirts of Bangkok

(AFP Photo/Nicolas Asfouri)

And last year the US downgraded the kingdom to its lowest ranking on human trafficking, a designation that can trigger sanctions.

Bangkok is desperate to improve its standing, while sanctions have not yet been imposed, laying out new measures including a ban on fishing workers under 18 in the months since. The latest Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report is due for imminent publication.

Observers say that while the latest threat of an EU ban has triggered a renewed sense of urgency in authorities, rushed actions will fail to combat illegal fishing in the long-term.

Improving "monitoring, control and surveillance" will help to tackle longstanding problems of pirate fishing, slavery and trafficking in Thailand's fisheries industry, said Daniel Murphy, a Bangkok-based campaigner for the Environmental Justice Foundation.

But by rapidly regulating the neglected sector the government "risks regularising more vessels than Thailand's exhausted waters can support as well a significant number of vessels which have spent years openly flouting fishing laws", he said.

In this handout photograph released by Indonesia’s Ministry of Fishery on

 April 8, 2015, hundreds of rescued foreign fishermen mostly from Myanmar and

Thailand are gathered during an operation at the private Indonesian fishing firm

 Pusaka Benjina Resources located in remote Benjina island of Maluku

province. (AFP Photo/Ugeng Nugroho/Ministry of Fishery)

Related Articles:

Thailand Faces EU Threat of Seafood Ban Over Lax Fishing Rules

Thailand Tells Indonesia It Will Tackle Illegal Fishing

Joko praises Minister Susi’s Work on Combating Illegal Fishing

A fisherman formerly held in slave-like conditions by a Thai-owned fishing firm in

Benjina, Maluku, shows evidence of abuse. (Antara Foto/Humas Kementerian

Kelautan)

Myanmar carries out first rescue operation of migrant boat

Myanmar's navy has rescued a migrant boat after increased pressure from its neighbors to tackle the issue. But questions remain whether the state can aid the Rohingya, which have been the target of attacks in the past.

Deutsche Welle, 23 May 2015

Myanmar's navy carried out the country's first rescue of a migrant boat, saving 208 people in the process, an official said Friday.

"A navy ship found two boats…on May 21 while on patrol," Tin Maung Swe, a senior official in the state of Rakhine, told AFP news agency. In 2012, Rakhine gained notoriety after Buddhist monks in the state violently attacked Rohingya Muslims, leaving approximately 140,000 displaced.

Myanmar was accused this week of not doing enough to combat the migrant crisis originating from its shores, prompting Malaysia and Indonesia to avoid a humanitarian crisis by taking in Rohingya and economic migrants stranded at sea.

The official said that "about 200 Bengalis were on one of the boats," using the term pejoratively to refer to the Muslim Rohingya minority. "All of the 208 on board are from Bangladesh," Swe added, recapitulating Myanmar's official line that the minority group comes from its western neighbor.

'Discrimination and violence'

The rescue operation comes a day after a senior general met with US Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken to discuss the migrant crisis.

However, the general cast doubts over the authenticity of some of the Rohingya migrants' claims during the meeting, Myanmar's state-backed newspaper The Global New Light of Myanmar reported.

"Senior General Min Aung Hlaing hinted that most victims are expected to assume themselves to be Rohingyas from Myanmar in the hope of receiving assistance from UNHCR," the newspaper said Friday.

During the meeting, Blinken urged Myanmar to tackle the cause of migration, "including the racially and religiously motivated discrimination and violence."

Myanmar's 1.1 million Rohingya Muslims are considered stateless and forced to live in camps for internally displaced people following deadly clashes in 2012, which Human Rights Watch called "a campaign of ethnic cleansing against the Rohingya."

ls/kms (AFP, dpa, Reuters)

PKS Calls for Immediate Response to Growing Rohingya Refugee Crisis

Jakarta Globe, May 17, 2015

Rohingya migrants who recently arrived in Indonesia by boat wait in line to be
registered in Kuala Langsa, in Aceh province, on Sunday. The United Nations has
 called on countries around the Andaman Sea not to push back the thousands of
desperate Bangladeshis and Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar now stranded in
rickety boats, and to rescue them instead. (Reuters Photo/Roni Bintang)

Jakarta. Legislators from an Indonesian Islamic party have urged the government to address the Rohingya boatpeople crisis by issuing a regulation allowing Jakarta to assist the migrants, including by providing temporary shelter for them.

Fahri Hamzah, a deputy speaker of the House of Representatives, said in Jakarta on Sunday that he was concerned with media reports that Indonesian officials had prohibited boats carrying hundreds of Rohingya migrants from reaching Indonesian shores.

He said he understood that officials were turning the boats back because of a lack of legal grounds to assist the refugees, but added this should not be the case.

“[Lack of regulation] should not be an excuse to turn a blind eye to the suffering of people from other nations,” said Fahri, also a deputy secretary general of the Islamic-based Prosperous Justice Party, or PKS.

“Their suffering is evident. Do we, as a nation that believes in humanity, have the heart to see them suffer?”

He urged President Joko Widodo to issue a presidential regulation to specifically address the growing crisis at sea.

Fahri added that Indonesia should not treat the boatpeople the same way that neighboring Malaysia and Thailand are doing, by pushing the boats out of their national waters in what the International Organization for Migration has blasted as a perverse game of “maritime ping-pong.”

Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand have been criticized for sending Rohingya refugees back to sea on rickety, unseaworthy boats after catching them in the countries’ waters or after also giving them food.

Indonesia and Malaysia last week saw a surge in refugees from Bangladesh and Myanmar following a Thai government crackdown on human trafficking, under which the Thai authorities are blocking boats carrying migrants from landing.

Neither of the governments of the three countries has responded to an appeal made by the United Nations’ refugee agency, the UNHCR, last week for an international search and rescue operation for the thousands believed to be stranded in Southeast Asian waters.

The UNHCR has said several thousand migrants were abandoned at sea by smugglers after the Thai crackdown, warning that the region is risking a “massive humanitarian crisis,” Reuters reported.

Another PKS legislator, Sukamta, said last week that Indonesia’s immigration law and international relations law actually addressed the matter of migrants, including refugees and asylum seekers.

He added, though, that the lack of derivative regulations meant there were no technical details for officials to adhere to in addressing actual problems.

“There is no presidential decree yet for those laws. The presidential decree should serve as an operational guideline for how we should treat refugees,” said Sukamta, a member of House Commission I, which oversees defense and foreign affairs.

“We want to make sure that this country, Indonesia, sides with humanity, at least by providing [the refugees] with temporary shelter. The government can do this as long as it has the will to,” he added as quoted by state-run news agency Antara.

Malaysian Foreign Minister Anifah Aman on Sunday said he would hold separate meetings this week with his Indonesian and Thai counterparts to discuss the Rohingya migrant crisis — including to work out a collective proposal under Asean and discuss it with Myanmar to resolve the Rohingya migrant crisis.

“As Asean chairman, we will discuss in depth, so that this problem will be solved. I hope Myanmar will sit with us to find solutions before we take it to the international level,” Anifah said, according to Malaysian newspaper The Star.

“If necessary, we will call for an emergency Asean meeting as suggested by the Prime Minister,’’ he  added.

University of Indonesia international law professor Hikmahanto Juwana said Indonesia must be able to convince Malaysia and Thailand to allow Rohingya migrants to enter their territories so that the ill sick could be given medical treatment.

“We’ve already done the right thing if we focus on the humanitarian aspect, especially for those who have entered Indonesia, such as those who have been rescued by Indonesian fishermen,” he said.

“Don’t ever send them back to sea; don’t give them food and then send them away like Thailand and Malaysia have done.”

He suggested Indonesia could set up a refugee camp on one of its thousands of islands, as it did for Vietnamese war refugees on Galang Island in Riau Islands province.

“Financially, we cannot run such an island alone. We would need help from others. We need to discuss this with the UNHCR,” Hikmahanto said.

Most importantly, he went on, the issue would never be resolved without serious discussions with Myanmar, which refuses to recognize the Rohingya or acknowledge the discrimination and violence they face in the country.

Myanmar has refused to attend crisis talks on the issue slated for May 29 in Thailand if other countries use the word “Rohingya” at the meeting, saying it does not recognize the term.

One of migrants housed in a makeshift camp in Langsa,

 Indonesia, shows the scars he says are from violence that erupted

 on the boats while still at sea. Photograph: Antonio Zambardino/

Guardian

Related Articles:

'They hit us, with hammers, by knife': Rohingya migrants tell of horror at sea
Over 900 migrants rescued as pressure grows over SE Asia crisis

Over 900 migrants rescued as pressure grows over SE Asia crisis

Yahoo – AFP, Nurdin Hasan, 15 May 2015

A group of rescued migrant children at a shelter in the Indonesian fishing

 town of Kuala Langsa, Aceh province, on May 15, 2015 (AFP Photo/Chaideer

Mahyuddin)

About 900 Rohingya and Bangladeshi migrants made it to shore in Indonesia and Thailand Friday, as Myanmar undermined calls for a coordinated response to Southeast Asia's human-trafficking crisis by threatening to boycott a planned summit.

The Indonesian and Malaysian policy of turning away stricken boats filled with Bangladeshis and ethnic Rohingya from Myanmar has been met with outrage, including from Washington and the United Nations.

Activists estimate up to 8,000 migrants may be at sea in Southeast Asia, with horrific tales emerging of passengers abandoned by abusive smugglers, horribly cramped conditions, starvation and death.

In his first public comments on the issue, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said he was "very concerned with the plight of migrants" but gave no indication of a policy shift on an issue that has caused regional finger-pointing.

A group of rescued women and children migrants, mostly Rohingya from

 Myanmar and Bangladesh, pictured at a confinement area in the fishing town 

of Kuala Langsa in Aceh province, northern Indonesia on May 15, 2015 

(AFP Photo/Januar)

"We are in contact with all relevant parties, with whom we share the desire to find a solution to this crisis," he said in a statement, without elaborating.

It was not clear whether those "relevant parties" included Myanmar, which faces harsh criticism of its treatment of Rohingya and on Friday snubbed neighbouring Thailand's call for a regional meeting on the problem on May 29.

'We cried for help'

The unfolding humanitarian crisis appears to have been precipitated by a Thai police crackdown that has thrown busy people-smuggling routes into chaos just as a surge of migrants has taken to the sea.

"We are unlikely to attend... we do not accept it if they (Thailand) are inviting us just to ease the pressure they are facing," Myanmar presidential office director Zaw Htay told AFP.

Indonesian police said at least 797 people were rescued Friday by fisherman in Aceh province on the east coast of huge Sumatra island.

Rescued migrants, mostly Rohingya from Myanmar and Bangladesh, gathere

 on arrival at a confinement area in the fishing town of Kuala Langsa in Indonesia's

Aceh province on May 15, 2015 (AFP Photo/Januar)

One overloaded boat was sinking off the coast when local fishermen came to the rescue, picking up migrants as they jumped from the stricken vessel, police said.

Muhammad Amin, a Rohingya, told AFP that the boat had first been turned back by the Indonesian navy towards Malaysian waters, only for the Malaysian navy to direct it back towards Indonesia.

In an increasingly desperate situation -- after nearly two months at sea and the crew having abandoned ship -- he said the Bangladeshis attacked the Rohingya and threw some of them overboard, and he was forced to swim for hours before being rescued.

"As we were swimming, we saw a fishing boat, and we cried for help, then fishermen pulled us one by one from the sea," said the 35-year-old.

'Human ping pong'

Search and rescue officials said it was not immediately clear whether all those rescued had come from the same boat.

Fishermen and National Park officials provide food supplies to Rohingya migrants

 stranded on a boat drifting in Thai waters off the southern island of Koh Lipe 

on May 14, 2015 (AFP Photo/Christophe Archambault)

At least 61 children were ferried to shore by Indonesian fishermen. Nearly 600 migrants were already sheltering in Aceh after managing to get ashore in recent days.

A military spokesman said earlier the navy had prevented a boat carrying migrants from entering Indonesian waters but he later clarified that the boat had been empty, and the navy found migrants in the water nearby and helped them to shore.

In Thailand, the navy discovered 106 Rohingya on an island off the coast of Phang Na province but it was unclear whether their boat had a problem or they had been abandoned, the provincial governor said.

Earlier Friday, a boat carrying about 300 Rohingya left Thailand's waters, a Thai official said, after authorities repaired its engine and provided food.

A Thai official said the passengers -- who wanted to reach Malaysia -- declined offers to come ashore in Thailand, fearing they would be sent back to Myanmar.

They planned instead to make for Indonesia, the official said.

Rohingya migrants on a boat drifting in Thai waters off the southern island of Koh

Lipe in the Andaman sea on May 14, 2015 (AFP Photo/Christophe Archambault)

Regional governments have been roundly chastised for what Human Rights Watch described as a deadly game of "human ping pong" in rejecting migrants.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein voiced serious concern, saying he was "appalled" at the migrant boat push-backs "which will inevitably lead to many avoidable deaths."

The Muslim Rohingya flee by the thousands each year to escape state-sanctioned discrimination in Buddhist-majority Myanmar and recent sectarian violence against them.

There are more than a million Rohingya living in Myanmar's western state of Rakhine, many going back generations, but Myanmar insists they are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

The Bangladeshis are thought mainly to be economic migrants escaping their country's grinding poverty.

Related Article:

Almost 500 Rohingya rescued off Indonesia: officials

Almost 500 Rohingya rescued off Indonesia: officials

Yahoo – AFP, 10 May 2015

Migrants from Myanmar and Bangladesh pictured at a shelter in Matang Raya

village in northern Aceh, Indonesia on May 10, 2015 (AFP Photo/Reza Juanda)

Jakarta (AFP) - Rescuers on Sunday brought ashore 469 migrants from Myanmar and Bangladesh after their wooden boat arrived off Aceh in northwest Indonesia, an official said.

"We received a report from fishermen this morning that there were boat people stranded in the waters off north Aceh," Aceh provincial search and rescue chief Budiawan told AFP.

"We despatched teams there and evacuated 469 migrants who are Rohingya from Myanmar and Bangladeshis. There are women and children among them. So far, all of them are safe," he added.

He said the group would be taken to a detention centre in north Aceh district, where police and immigration officials would carry out "further processing" which would include investigating their motives.

Darsa, a disaster management agency official who like many Indonesians goes by one name, told AFP the group had arrived near a beach in north Aceh district early Sunday and were told to swim to shore.

"One of the migrants who could speak Malay told me that their agent had told them they were in Malaysia, and to swim to shore," he said.

"Some of them did. But later they found out from fishermen that they were in Indonesia," he added.

According to the migrant, five boats had departed from Myanmar last week to escape the conflict in their country, Darsa said.

"He said the Muslims were beaten and had hot water poured on them and they just wanted to get out of Myanmar as soon as possible, to anywhere where they could seek refuge," he said.

Buddhist-majority Myanmar views its population of roughly 800,000 Rohingya as illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, and they have been targeted in outbreaks of sectarian violence there in recent years, prompting many to flee.

Migrant women and children from Myanmar and Bangladesh wait at a shelter

 in Matang Raya village in northern Aceh, Indonesia, on May 10, 2015 (AFP 

Photo/Reza Juanda)

Darsa said there were 83 women and 41 children on board. One of the women was pregnant and some of the children were aged under 10.

"There was little food and water on the boat. Some of them were not doing too well and needed medical attention," he said.

Thousands of Muslim Rohingya have braved the dangerous sea crossing from Myanmar to southern Thailand and beyond in recent years.

Many hope to go on to mainly Muslim Malaysia but the migrants have often fallen prey to people-traffickers in Thailand.

The UN considers the Rohingya to be one of the world's most persecuted minorities.

Thailand Faces EU Threat of Seafood Ban Over Lax Fishing Rules

Jakarta Globe, Jonathan Stearns, Apr 21, 2015 

In this handout photograph released by Indonesia’s Ministry of Fishery on
 April 8, 2015, hundreds of rescued foreign fishermen mostly from Myanmar and
Thailand are gathered during an operation at the private Indonesian fishing firm
 Pusaka Benjina Resources located in remote Benjina island of Maluku
province. (AFP Photo/Ugeng Nugroho/Ministry of Fishery)

The European Union threatened to ban imports of seafood from Thailand because of concerns about illegal fishing, a step that would curb trade of more than 600 million euros ($641 million) a year.

The European Commission said Thailand has been too lax in the international fight against unlawful, unregulated and unreported fishing. Thai authorities have six months to enact “a corrective tailor-made action plan” or risk an EU trade ban, said the commission, the 28-nation bloc’s regulatory arm.

“Failure to take strong action against illegal fishing will carry consequences,” EU Fisheries Commissioner Karmenu Vella said in an e-mailed statement on Tuesday in Brussels. “Should the situation not improve, the EU could resort to banning fisheries imports from Thailand.”

The EU is seeking to use the size of its seafood market to prod exporting countries around the world to promote sustainable fisheries. The total value of EU imports of fish products last year was 20.7 billion euros, of which Thailand accounted for 642 million euros, according to the commission.

The EU already prohibits imports of seafood from Guinea, Cambodia and Sri Lanka because those three countries allegedly haven’t done enough to tackle illegal fishing. The bloc last year added Belize to the European fisheries blacklist before lifting the curbs on that nation following “reforming efforts” by authorities there.

In its statement today, the commission withdrew warnings it had issued against South Korea and the Philippines about illegal fishing. Both countries have since improved their legal systems and are “now equipped to tackle illegal fishing,” the commission said.

Bloomberg

A fisherman formerly held in slave-like conditions by a Thai-owned fishing firm in

Benjina, Maluku, shows evidence of abuse. (Antara Foto/Humas Kementerian

Kelautan)

Related Article:

Joko praises Minister Susi’s Work on Combating Illegal Fishing

Joko Praises Minister Susi’s Work on Combating Illegal Fishing

Jakarta Globe, Novy Lumanauw, Apr 07, 2015

A fisherman formerly held in slave-like conditions by a Thai-owned fishing firm in
Benjina, Maluku, shows evidence of abuse. (Antara Foto/Humas Kementerian
Kelautan)

Jakarta. President Joko Widodo on Tuesday expressed support for Maritime and Fisheries Minister Susi Pudjiastuti and called on her to continue tackling illegal fishing in Indonesian waters.

Joko was speaking in response to a year-long Associated Press investigation that revealed the use of slave labor by at least one company operating in Benjina in Maluku’s Aru Islands district. A Thai-owned fishing company based in Benjina was recently discovered to have confined and exploited fishermen, mostly from Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos and Thailand, in slavery conditions.

“This is an international issue and I want thorough reporting on it,” Joko said.

Susi said she was disturbed to learn that Pusaka Benjina Resources had been keeping at least 327 slaves in captivity, working under the threat of torture or even death. The ministry has since shut down the company.

The revelation has prompted the ministry to pledge closer monitoring of fishing companies operating throughout Indonesia.

Susi said her office quickly inspected other companies operating in Benjina and found a further 1,185 fishermen living in similar conditions.

The minister said there was evidence other firms in the area were using slave labor — and had been doing so for years.

The director general for monitoring of maritime resources, Asep Burhanuddin, said the ministry had formed a task force with local prosecutors, immigration officials, the Navy and the National Police.

On Friday, days after the story broke, the task force was deployed to Benjina. The workers, some of whom had been enslaved for nine years, were taken to Tual, an island around 100 kilometers west of Aru, from where they were repatriated.

Company officials have been charged with human trafficking and violating the Manpower Law.

Meanwhile, Joko also asked the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Center (PPATK) to monitor the flow of funds to illegal fishing vessels to aid Susi in her crackdown.

“She’s done good work and the ministry needs to keep it up,” Joko said in a discussion about illegal fishing. “All ministries and the PPATK need to continue working together so we can find out everything about illegal fishing,” he added.

“The Maritime and Fisheries Ministry needs this knowledge so that it can act accordingly and based on the facts.”

Related Article:

Scores of Seafood Slaves in Indonesia, Officials Turned Blind Eye: Report

Scores of Seafood Slaves in Indonesia, Officials Turned Blind Eye: Report

Jakarta Globe, Tri Listiyarini, Apr 05, 2015

Maritime and Fisheries Minister Susi Pudjiastuti says she will closely monitor
 fishing companies operating in Indonesia to prevent slave labor. (Reuters
Photo/Tim Wimborne)

Jakarta. Maritime and Fisheries Minister Susi Pudjiastuti pledged to closely monitor fishing companies operating in Indonesia after a year-long Associated Press investigation revealed at least one Indonesian firm — and likely many more — using slave labor.

Susi said she was disturbed to learn Pusaka Benjina Resources had been keeping 327 workers, mainly from Myanmar, working in captivity without pay, on pain of torture or even death.

Her office has since shut down the company, based in Benjina, in Maluku’s Aru Islands district.

“We will launch an investigation; we will sanction [those involved],” the minister said on the sidelines of her visit to a fishing village in Pangandaran, West Java.

“In Benjina, even though the victims are foreigners, Indonesia felt it must take action because [the case] happened within Indonesia’s jurisdiction,” she said.

Susi said her office quickly inspected other fishing companies operating in Benjina and found 1,185 fishermen working there, mostly from Cambodia, Thailand and Myanmar, in slave-like conditions.

The minister said there was rampant evidence that other firms in the area were using slave labor — and had been for years.

With the help of sympathetic locals, the AP interviewed the Myanmar workers, who said they were forced to work 22 hours a day, whipped with toxic stingray tails, denied any pay, and barred from returning to their home country or tell anyone about their plight. Some were put in cages.

The director general for monitoring maritime resources, Asep Burhanuddin,  said the ministry formed a task force with the local prosecutors, immigration offices, the Indonesian Navy and National Police.

On Friday, days after the story broke, task force officials deployed to Benjina for a crackdown.

“We were able to confirm that there are slavery practices [at PBR],” Asep told Detik on Sunday. “Some were electrocuted for the tiniest mistake like falling to sleep. This is inhumane.”

The workers, some of whom have been slaves for nine years, were taken to the Tual, some 100 kilometers west of Aru Islands, where they were repatriated.

Company officials have been charged with human trafficking and violating the Manpower Law while the task force investigates who else may have been involved.

Li confident South China Sea issue 'can be handled properly'

Want China Times, Xinhua 2014-11-12

Li Keqiang. (File photo/CNS)

China's premier, Li Keqiang, has expressed confidence that differences on the South China Sea issue can be handled properly as long as relevant parties maintain dialogue and consultation and strengthen maritime cooperation.

"These differences should not affect regional stability or overall China-ASEAN relations nor will they ever hamper freedom and safety of navigation in the South China Sea," Li wrote in Tuesday's edition of the Jakarta Post.

Since the start of the year, China and relevant countries have had effective communication and dialogue on the South China Sea issue and reached a lot of important common ground, Li noted. "We have identified the 'dual track approach' in handling the South China Sea issue, outlining the ideas that specific disputes be addressed by countries directly concerned through negotiation and consultation and that peace and stability in the South China Sea be jointly upheld by China and ASEAN countries," he said.

"We are fully confident that as long as we stick to the right track, maintain the momentum of dialogue and consultation and strengthen practical maritime cooperation, we will be able to handle the South China Sea issue properly," he added.

Li, who will be in Myanmar on Wednesday to attend an annual meeting of East Asian leaders, has lauded the cooperation between China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as a positive force for regional cooperation and envisioned a bright future for the ties.

"China and ASEAN countries are neighbors sharing land and sea borders. We have a common land boundary of over 4,000 km. For hundreds of years, our cultural interactions and close bonds have represented a fine model of exchanges, mutual learning and common development of different ethnicities, religions and cultures in the history of East Asia," Li wrote.

"China is a staunch force for peace in East Asia and China supports ASEAN in playing a positive role in regional stability," he said.

Li will attend the 17th China-ASEAN summit, the 17th ASEAN Plus Three Summit (ASEAN plus China, Japan and South Korea), and the 9th East Asia Summit in Nay Pyi Taw, Myanmar, from Wednesday to Friday. He will pay an official visit to Myanmar after the meetings.

The Chinese premier said he looks forward to seeing more solid steps and fruitful outcomes resulting from China-ASEAN cooperation. "China was the first to join the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, the first to establish strategic partnership with ASEAN and the first to propose the signing of a treaty on good neighborliness, friendship and cooperation with ASEAN," Li wrote.

He labeled the China-ASEAN cooperation "a positive force driving regional development."

China is ASEAN's largest trading partner and its third largest source of investment and was the first country to launch free trade area (FTA) negotiations with ASEAN, Li noted.

In 2013, trade between China and ASEAN hit US$443.6 billion. Accumulated two-way investment totaled US$120 billion and about 18 million visits were made between the two sides.

The cooperation initiatives China put forward in the past year included plans to build a 21st Century Maritime Silk Road together with ASEAN and to strengthen the China-ASEAN 2+7 cooperation framework: deepening strategic mutual trust, focusing on economic cooperation, plus deepening cooperation in the seven key areas of political affairs, economy and trade, connectivity, finance, maritime cooperation, security, and people-to-people exchanges, he wrote in the article.

On the sidelines of the meetings, Li and leaders of ASEAN countries will continue discussions on the signing of a treaty of good neighborliness, friendship and cooperation.

In addition, the third action plan of the Joint Declaration on the Strategic Partnership for Peace and Prosperity will be jointly formulated and cooperation in defense and non-traditional security areas will be promoted.

Efforts will be made to conclude regional FTA negotiations regarding the upgraded China-ASEAN FTA and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) by the end of 2015.

Li said China will launch the fundraising for the second phase of the China-ASEAN Fund on Investment Cooperation and the China Development Bank will also set up a China-ASEAN special loan for infrastructure development.

Maritime cooperation has become a new highlight in China-ASEAN cooperation, said Li, adding that China proposes that next year be designated as the "Year of China-ASEAN Maritime Cooperation" to strengthen cooperation in marine economy, marine science and technology, protection of marine ecology and maritime connectivity.

According to Li, China will scale up investment in underdeveloped ASEAN countries and strengthen exchanges and cooperation with countries along the Mekong River in key areas like poverty reduction, social development and other areas with a view to helping narrow the development gap within ASEAN.

China welcomes the establishment of the ASEAN Community next year, the first time in Asia's history that a regional community is established, Li said.

China will continue to take ASEAN as a priority in its neighborhood diplomacy and firmly support the unity and growth of ASEAN, the building of the ASEAN Community and ASEAN's centrality in regional cooperation, Li said.

China and ASEAN both stand to benefit from East Asia's prosperity and stability, and both stand to uphold such prosperity and stability, he said.

The Chinese premier proposed that the two sides strengthen dialogue and coordination, broaden convergence of interests and lead countries in the region toward an East Asian Community.

"We also welcome countries from outside the region to join East Asia cooperation and contribute positively to peace and development of Asia and the Asia-Pacific as a whole," Li said.

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