TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — A fishing boat captain surnamed Chen (陳) and an associate surnamed Hsu (許) were charged with the sale of conservation status Omura's whale jawbones obtained around Taichung.
The Taichung District Prosecutors Office handed down a suspended one-year sentence. Chen and Hsu were ordered to pay fines of NT$20,000 (US$616) and NT$30,000, respectively, per CNA.
The Ocean Conservation Administration’s Marine Conservation Department said Chen caught the whale jawbones while trawling off the coast of Taichung in September 2022. He contacted Hsu to sell the jawbones online, which sold for NT$660,000.
The public discovered and reported the sale. At Kaohsiung’s Xingda Fishing Port on May 28, a task force seized the container of two whale jawbones approximately 2.74 meters in length.
The National Museum of Natural Science traced the jawbones to the Omura's whale, a species on the conservation list identified as “data deficient."
The Marine Protection Agency said the Omura's whale is a medium-sized whale with an obvious longitudinal ridge in the center of its upper jaw. Its dorsal fin is an upright sickle shape, located in the rear two-thirds of the body, and it has flame-shaped stripes extending to the lower back.
The Marine Conservation Agency said the Omura's whale was only identified in 1992, as there is a lack of scientific data on global population numbers. It is endangered according to the “red list” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
Omura's whale is known to be distributed in tropical to warm waters from India to the Pacific. There have been a few reports of whale strandings off Taiwan's east and west coasts, and whale-watching boats operating out of Hualien have sighted them.
The Marine Conservation Agency said all cetaceans are protected animals covered by the Wildlife Conservation Act. If the public finds or suspects illegal activities, they should collect photos, videos, or other evidence to report to local conservation authorities, or call the Coast Guard's "118" hotline.