Correspondence
Letter couriered from Shanghai and confirmed delivered.
The letter described abuses on a jigger owned by Rongcheng Wangdao, the Zhen Fa 7, including the death of one crew member and disembarkation of a second for medical care after mistreatment on board, and multiple indicators of forced labor among the ship’s crew.
Rongcheng Wangdao replied by email, saying the company took the allegations concerning the Zhen Fa 7 seriously and so looked into the matter. The email said that all crew said that living and working on board continued as normal and that the Indonesian manning agency never received such complaints from returned seafarers. It added that, after receiving the letter about the Zhen Fa 7, Rongcheng Wangdao reported the situation to the China Ocean Fisheries Association. The company added that it doesn't know where The Outlaw Ocean Project obtained its “false information”, but if it wants to know more about the matter, it should contact the China Ocean Fisheries Association directly and Wangdao will cooperate with any investigation by the association.
The Outlaw Ocean Project Emailed Rongcheng Wangdao asking the company about its jigger Zhen Fa 9 being fined by Peruvian authorities for illegal, unreported, or unregulated fishing in 2017 and another of its vessels being observed fishing in NK waters in 2019.
The Outlaw Ocean Project emailed Rongcheng Wangdao, asking for comment from the captain and bosun of the vessel on the following 16 points, based on The Outlaw Ocean Project's reporting: 1. Officers insulted and struck deckhands when angry with them. 2. The bosun slapped and punched workers for mistakes. 3. Captain Chang Haijun allowed the Chinese crew members to call home but said no to the Indonesian crew members. 4. 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. 5. 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. 6. A deckhand named Heri Kusmanto was constantly beaten for dropping squid out of hundred-pound baskets he was made to carry down stairs. 7. 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. 8. 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. 9. 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. 10. 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. 11. 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. 12. 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. 13. 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 ambulance workers arrived to find Aritonang lying alone on the dock. 14. Daniel Aritonang told a worker in Montevideo, Uruguay, that he was beaten and tied by the neck while on board the Zhen Fa 7. 15. 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. 16. The Zhen Fa 7 transshipped with a company that has employed at least three hundred Uyghur or other minority workers transferred from Xinjiang.