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Nine Taiwanese have been indicted on charges relating to the forced labor and physical abuse of foreign crew members on an offshore fishing vessel, the Kaohsiung District Prosecutors Office said on Wednesday.
Prosecutors found that crew members aboard the Vanuata-flagged Da Wang (大旺), owned and operated by the Kaohsiung-based Yong Feng Fishery Ltd., were subject to beatings, insults, confinement, and threats to withhold or deduct wages while working in the Pacific Ocean in 2019 and 2020. |
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The vessel's captain, surnamed Lin (林), the first mate, surnamed Liang (梁), and seven others were indicted for their role in the suspected abuses of more than 20 Indonesian and Filipino workers, prosecutors said.
According to prosecutors, there were incidents in which the captain and the first mate forcibly threw the clothes of crew members into the ocean despite freezing cold weather.
In addition, for ship meals, pork was used as the main dish most of the time, resulting in Muslim workers being forced to eat pork, which their religion generally forbids, to survive. |
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