2-year sentences sought for Chinese men who illegally sailed to Taiwan

Taipei, Sept. 24 (CNA) Prosecutors on Thursday indicted two Chinese nationals for illegally entering Taiwan after sailing across the Taiwan Strait on a rubber dinghy, recommending that each be sentenced to two years in prison.

The case came to light on Aug. 10, when an unidentified user on Threads wrote that a fisherman had found a rubber dinghy on a beach near Taipei Port in July, which they initially thought belonged to another fisherman.

After inspecting the vessel more closely the next day, however, the fisherman found life vests, Chinese-made fuel containers, and rolls of toilet paper with writing in Simplified Chinese, and reported the case to law enforcement, the user wrote.

After learning of the incident on July 24, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) launched an investigation, and ultimately detained two male Chinese nationals, surnamed Luan (欒) and Yu (于), at Chaoyang Forest Park in Taoyuan on July 30.

The two men were turned over to the Shilin District Prosecutors Office, which received court permission to hold the men in incommunicado detention on Aug. 3.

In an indictment filed Thursday, prosecutors said Luan and Yu had set out by car from Qingdao, Shandong Province on July 19, and later purchased an outboard motor for their raft in Jinhua, Zhejiang Province.

On July 22, the two men launched their raft from the shoreline outside Fuzhou, Fujian Province at 4 or 5 a.m., crossing the Taiwan Strait and reaching the Taipei Port's northern jetty around 2 a.m. on July 23.

After illegally entering Taiwan, Luan and Yu traveled to locations in New Taipei, Taipei, Hsinchu, Taichung and Taoyuan, before being arrested by Coast Guard investigators on July 30, prosecutors said.

Prosecutors said they had based their indictment on suspect and witness statements, cell phone data, surveillance video footage, and DNA analysis. They charged both Luan and Yu with violations of the Immigration Act and the Cross-Strait Act.

In light of the "substantive harm" Luan and Yu's actions caused to Taiwan's border control, coastal defense security and public order -- as well as the "severe public anxiety" aroused by their case -- prosecutors requested that both men be sentenced to two years in prison.

The indictment's strong language likely referred to public criticism the Coast Guard received for failing to detect the men's raft, which led the agency's director to apologize on Aug. 11, one day after the incident became public.