Correspondence
Letter couriered from Shanghai and confirmed delivered.
The letter said: "My name is Ian Urbina and I’m the director of The Outlaw Ocean Project, a journalism non-profit based in Washington D.C. that publishes stories about human rights and environmental issues connected with the sea.
I’m writing to you in light of our latest investigation, which concerns the Chinese squid fishing fleet and one of your squid fishing vessels, the Zhen Fa 7 (振发7). We have found that over a seven-month period from August 2020 to March 2021, one Zhen Fa 7 crew member died and a second was disembarked for emergency medical treatment after suffering serious mistreatment and abuse while on board the vessel.
Our reporting also documents multiple indicators of forced labor among crew onboard this vessel: recruitment linked to debt, deceptive recruitment, enforced isolation, degrading living conditions, physical violence, wage withholding, the retention of personal identity documents and strong financial penalties for leaving employment.
We have identified a list of other squid fishing vessels that are connected to instances of forced labor, violence, illegal fishing, and crew neglect. We’ve heard from multiple stakeholders at all levels of the squid industry - importers, exporters, ship owners, cold storage owners, processing companies - that there are many places where the catch can get comingled, which makes it extremely difficult for squid exporters to know with certainty that their products do not come from vessels involved in abuses. At the reefer level, after squid is caught by multiple ships, it can be comingled. At the docks level, it can get comingled as it comes off the ships. At the processing level, it can get comingled in the plant. There’s also the reality of collectives in China and conglomerates that often trade between each other.
Please let us know by Monday, January 23, 2023 if you have any comment or statement to make on the record in response to this information."
Rongcheng Wangdao replied by email: "Thank you for your interest in our company. After receiving your letter, we prioritised the matter and immediately contacted the vessel Zhen Fa No. 7. At the same time, we also entrusted an Indonesian employment company to investigate this matter.
According to feedback from the vessel Zhen Fa No. 7, we gathered that the daily living and work of all the sailors, including foreign crew members, on the vessel were normal. In addition, the ethnic beliefs and lifestyle habits of the foreign crew members were deeply respected on the vessel. There was nothing regarding your alleged appalling incidents about abuse, violation, insults to one’s character, physical violence or withheld salaries.
Neither has the Indonesian employment company ever received the kind of feedback you mentioned in the letter from the sailors who returned to their country. According to an investigation they conducted in the last few days, none of the sailors mentioned that the vessel Zhen Fa No. 7 was facing the situation you had described.
My company is a regular distant-water fishery company. As soon as we received your letter, we notified the China Oversea Fishery Association. We also submitted to the association a report providing the evidence from our investigation. We do not know from which avenues you, Mr Ian, had obtained the fake information. If Mr Ian would like to continue checking this matter, please contact the China Oversea Fishery Association directly, and we will cooperate with the association’s investigation."
The Outlaw Ocean Project emailed Rongcheng Wangdao: "Thank you for your previous statement in response to our questions about the experiences of crew on board the Zhen Fa 7. We have additional questions for your company, about the activities of other fishing vessels owned by Rongcheng Wangdao Dayang 荣成市王岛大洋水产有限公司. According to records by the Peruvian Ministry of Production, one of your vessels – Zhen Fa 9 – was fined for failing to submit fishing reports, results or other documents while in Peruvian waters in 2017. Do you have any explanation of why 振发9 was conducting unreported fishing at this time? Another vessel, Lu Rong Yuan Yu 6157, was observed fishing in North Korean waters in 2019, in contravention of U.N. sanctions. Do you have any explanation of why it was fishing in this area, despite U.N. sanctions against this practice? Thank you for your time."
The Outlaw Ocean Project emailed Rongcheng Wangdao:
"I'm working on a magazine story about labor issues and other crimes at sea on board vessels of the Chinese fishing fleet. We have previously contacted your company for this story. We are reaching out to request a reply from the captain and bosun of the Zhen Fa 7, which we mention in the story, to our statements below.
Our reporting and several sources of information — including deckhands on the board the vessel, workers in Montevideo, Uruguay, photos and documents involved — have shown the following:
- Officers insulted and struck deckhands when angry with them.
- The bosun slapped and punched workers for mistakes.
- Captain Chang Haijun allowed the Chinese crew members to call home but said no to the Indonesian crew members.
- A crew member named Rahman Finando asked Haijun if he could leave the vessel and was denied, after which he was beaten by Chinese officers and deckhands to punish him for asking to leave.
- Indonesian crew members were issued two packs of Instant Noodles per day, but anything else such as other food, coffee, alcohol or cigarettes was deducted from their salaries.
- A deckhand named Heri Kusmanto was constantly beaten for dropping squid out of hundred-pound baskets he was made to carry down stairs.
- The Zhen Fa 7's cook often struck Heri Kusmanto, leading to him avoid the kitchen and eat only white rice, after which he developed symptoms of the disease beriberi, caused by a deficiency of thiamine/vitamin B1.
- The contract typically used by Kusmanto’s manning agency included heavy financial penalties for workers and their families if they quit prematurely, and allowed the company to take their identity papers, including their passport, during the recruitment process, and keep the documents if he failed to pay the fine for leaving early—provisions that violate anti-trafficking laws in the U.S. and Indonesia.
- Despite Heri Kusmanto's beriberi symptoms, including an inability to walk, captain Chang Haijun refused to allow Kusmanto to be disembarked to seek medical treatment. Haijun only allowed Kusmanto to disembark once the crew member became unable to get out of bed.
- During a period of February 2021 to TK, the Zhen Fa 7 turned off its locational transponder for as many as nineteen days, in violation of Chinese law.
- Shortly after New Year’s Day, 2021, the Zhen Fa 7 rounded the tip of South America and stopped briefly in Chilean waters, close enough to shore to make a phone call. A crew member named Daniel Aritonang went to the bridge and asked one of the officers if he could use the phone. The officer indicated that it would cost him, rubbing his finger and thumb together.
- In January 2021, the Zhen Fa 7 laid anchor in the Blue Hole, where Daniel Aritonnang fell ill with beriberi. The whites of his eyes turned yellow, his legs became swollen, and he lost his ability to walk. Other Indonesians on board asked Captain Chang Haijun to get Aritonang medical attention, but he refused. That February, the Zhen Fa 7 unloaded catch onto a reefer that carried it to Mauritius, but the captain refused to send Aritonang to shore as well. Within five days, Aritonang could no longer stand. He moaned in pain, slipping in and out of consciousness.
- On March 2nd, after Aritonang had fallen severly ill and other crewmembers had threatened to strike if nothing was done, Captain Chang Haijun transfered Aritonang to a Chinese fuel tanker called the Marlin, which agreed to carry him to Montevideo, Uruguay. The Marlin’s crew brought him by skiff to the port, dumped him there, and motored away. A port agent who worked on behalf of Chinese ships called the local hospital, and ambulanceworkers arrived to find Aritonang lying alone on the dock.
- Daniel Aritonang told a worker in Montevideo, Uruguay, that he was beaten and tied by the neck while on board the Zhen Fa 7.
- Daniel Aritonang died in Montevideo, Uruguay. In the emergency room, doctors tried to administer intravenous fluids but initially failed to get a needle into Aritonang’s arm; his veins had collapsed from dehydration.
- The Zhen Fa 7 transshipped with a company that has employed at least three hundred Uyghur or other minority workers transferred from Xinjiang.
We need an official response in writing from the captain and bosun of the Zhen Fa 7 on the above statements by the end of the business day on Monday, August 28."