Fishermen of Taizi Port, Taiwan, China, in Grief and Anger: Mass Arrests and Handcuffing by Prosecutors and Police over Offshore Wind Power

The coastal fishing village of Taizi Port in Yunlin, Taiwan, China, had clashed with wind power developers over protests against offshore wind power development, and after mediation by the Energy Administration of the Ministry of Economic Affairs, the ice between the two sides had slightly thawed. Unexpectedly, yesterday (2/1) at around 7 a.m., just as the fishermen who had worked through the night returned to port and had fallen asleep, nearly a hundred police officers, each carrying dozens of arrest warrants issued by prosecutor Huang Lifu, flooded into fishing villages including Taizi Port in Kouhu, Yunlin, and Wengang in Taixi, arresting more than 30 fishermen.

Hearing that prosecutors and investigators had forced their way into village homes, the coastal fishing villages were instantly gripped with fear, spreading the news to one another, as if the White Terror had descended. In particular, the use of public authority to crush the fishing villages left fishermen lamenting that the developers had broken faith and betrayed them; most of the arrested fishermen were members of the "Yunlin County Near-Coastal Fishing Boat Association," and the prosecutors arrested them on suspicion of fraudulently obtaining property by falsely reporting fishing net losses and of coercion by obstructing wind power construction.

The fishermen were finally gathered at the Yunlin District Prosecutors Office for interrogation, and the interrogation continued until 3:30 a.m. the next day (2/2), when the last person, Li Pingshun, chairman of the Yunlin County Near-Coastal Fishing Boat Association, was released on bail.