MANILA: Just two months after members of the Philippine Coast Guard fired at a Taiwanese boat in Balintang Channel off Batanes Islands, locals have reported seeing foreign fishing vessels in the area.
A video taken by Ryan Cantor, a local fisherman, purportedly shows a blue fishing vessel conducting activities off Ali Island in Itbayat, Batanes.
Cantor said that the Taiwanese were probably fishing since he saw a compressor with a hose, as one man was on the boat while three others were underwater, adding that the vessel stayed for two days.
Cantor was referring to a dangerous fishing method by which divers breathe from a hose attached to a low pressure air compressor mounted on the boat.
Batanes Governor Vicente Gato confirmed that residents and local authorities still see boats of foreigners and not only of Taiwan’s off the coasts.
Gato said that there were an estimated 20 fishing boats in the area.
The video was aired on television Thursday night, but Philippine Coast Guard spokesperson Lt Cmdr Armand Balilo said maritime officials could not do anything about it.
“After the Balintang incident, our men pulled out of the area,” Balilo said in a television interview. Balilo added that the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources vessel MCS-3001 used at the fatal shooting of the Taiwanese fisherman last May 9 is present at the coast for the investigation, and not anymore used to apprehend foreign poachers.
Gato also said that Batanes’ shores are unguarded until a newly acquired Coast Guard boat arrives in December from Japan.
He said that the military and the Coast Guard are having a hard time sending their large vessels since the biggest waves in the world are found at the Balintang Channel.
The Philippine star
