Chinese ship damages telecommunications cable off Taiwan

An undersea cable off the coast of Taiwan has allegedly been damaged by a Chinese ship in its latest sabotage incident.

A telecommunications cable was reportedly left damaged near Yehliu, New Taipei City on Friday, just days after Russian vessels were accused of deliberately cutting wires in the Baltic Sea. 

The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) and Chunghwa Telecom yesterday confirmed that the international undersea cable near Keelung Harbor had been cut by a Chinese ship, the Shunxin-39, a freighter registered in Cameroon. 

Chunghwa Telecom said the cable had its own backup equipment, and the incident would not affect telecommunications within Taiwan, as per the Taipei Times.

The CGA said it dispatched a ship under its first fleet after receiving word of the incident and located the Shunxin-39 13km north of Yehliu at around 4:40pm on Friday.

The CGA demanded that the Shunxin-39 return to seas closer to Keelung Harbor for examination where Taiwan's Coast Guard carried out investigations.

There, they found that four cores of the international cable had been scrambled.

Tracking data from the ship's automatic identification system signal and satellite data showed the Shunxin-39 pulled its anchor near to where the cable was destroyed, according to the Financial Times.

Officers reportedly traced down the cargo ship and demanded its return to the Port of Keelung.

The Coast Guard investigated the outside of the vessel and had a short conversation with the ship's captain, but officials could not board the vehicle due to poor weather conditions, as per local reports.    

They were forced to allow the vessel to journey on to South Korea as they could not hold it any longer under international laws, officials said.

But despite the ship displaying a Cameroon flag, Taiwan officials are convinced it is owned by China.

The Shunxin-39 is believed to have been purchased by Jie Yang Trading Limited, which is registered in Hong Kong.

The company's only listed director is a mainland Chinese man named Guo Wenjie, officials added.  

Kuma Academy chief executive officer Ho Cheng-hui said yesterday that while the incident was pending investigation, China has a long history of sabotaging Taiwanese infrastructure using various maritime tactics.

Ho said that the incident was a Chinese ploy to gauge the point at which the international community would draw a red line in an attempt to escalate its 'gray zone' tactics.

Sources: Daily Mail, Financial Times