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Taiwan-Japan meeting on fishing rights still up in the air

ROC Central News Agency

2013/03/05 14:45:45

Taipei, March 5 (CNA) Taiwan and Japan are still negotiating the details of their next preparatory meeting for a new round of bilateral fishery talks, a Taiwanese official reiterated Tuesday, but he said the meeting would most likely be held in Tokyo.

"Both sides are still in negotiations and have not yet made a final decision," said Su Chii-cherng, deputy director-general of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' Department of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, at a news briefing.

Foreign Minister David Lin said on Monday that the meeting will be held soon, and Su added little more a day later and would not comment on why it was taking so long to finalize the date and place of the encounter.

Taiwan and Japan have held 16 formal rounds of talks on fishing rights in their overlapping territories since 1996, the most recent coming in 2009.

But no new talks have been held since then due to differences on how to resolve the cross-border fishery disputes that mostly involve waters near the disputed Diaoyutai Islands in the East China Sea.

The two countries are hoping that a series of substantive preparatory meetings will help iron out some of the differences and improve the chances of success of a 17th round of talks.

An initial preparatory meeting took place in Tokyo on Nov. 30, 2012, with little progress being made, and Lin had hoped that a second meeting would be held in late February or early March.

At Tuesday's news briefing, Su was also unwilling to guess how many advance meetings would be needed before formal talks could take place.

"We hope the formal talks will be held with the idea of reaching a concrete agreement," he said.

Asked about the possibility of disputes between Taiwan and Japan in waters near the Diaoyutais as the fishing season nears, Su said the government has repeatedly urged Japan to respect Taiwanese fishermen's fishing rights even before the two sides have reached an agreement.

The Diaoyutais lie about 100 nautical miles northeast of Taiwan. They have been under Japan's administrative control since 1972, but are also claimed by Taiwan and China.

Taiwanese fishermen consider the waters near the islands to be their traditional fishing grounds, but they are routinely chased away from the area by Japanese authorities when they venture too close to what Japan sees as its territorial waters.

(By Elaine Hou)