Delaying fishing boat rescue mission blasted for MOFA
The China Post--Family members of the missing Kaohsiung-registered fishing boat yesterday blasted the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) for being unable to offer timely assistance to the ship that was reported missing on Jan. 10 near Indonesia.
With tears in her eyes, Lee Chia-yun, wife of skipper Tseng Yu-chun, accused the MOFA of delaying the rescue mission at a press conference held yesterday in the southern port city.
“We had given the latest updates regarding the whereabouts of the ship to the ministry since it went missing on Jan. 10. However, the ministry gave us no help and only told us that it was sunk,” she said.
According to Lee, the boat named “Chen Chi Jung” embarked from Kaohsiung Jan. 6 but lost contact four days later along with its crew of 16, which included Tseng and his son Tseng Yu-chun, an engineer and 13 Indonesian sailors.
They had contacted MOFA via the city's Marine Bureau on Jan. 12 and the ministry told them that its Indonesian office was asking for the government's help in finding the ship.
However, two days later, the ministry told Tseng's family that the boat appeared to have been damaged and capsized, with no one visible onboard, said Lin Kuo-cheng, a Kuomintang city council member who accompanied Lee in the press conference.
Only a day later, MOFA changed its story and noted that it had a Taiwanese official join Indonesia's navy for the rescue mission northwest of Sumatra where the boat allegedly went missing, Lin noted.
Then on Monday, Jan. 17, the foreign ministry revised their story yet again by saying that the official was still in Aceh Province, handling related affairs instead of joining the rescue mission, he said.
“The MOFA is apparently cheating us to cover its inability to offer help in rescuing the missing boat,” Lin noted.
In response to the accusation made by the Tseng's family, MOFA spokesman James Chang yesterday noted that it could be a misunderstanding between both sides over the incident.
“We asked our representative there to visit the Indonesian navy to learn the latest developments in the rescue mission right after we received the report the ship was missing,” Chang said at a regular briefing yesterday.
The ministry had asked the country's rescue team and the Aceh provincial governor to continue the search until they found the missing crew, he added.Read More ...
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