MANILA, Philippines – Thirty-five Filipinos detained in Manado for illegal fishing in Indonesian waters have returned home, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said yesterday.
The fishermen, who were detained at the Immigration Center in Manado and the Marine and Fisheries Resource Base in Bitung, arrived in Davao City on May 25.
They were repatriated by the Philippine consulate general in Manado.
Representatives of the DFA Regional Consular Office in Davao City, Department of Social Welfare and Development and Sarangani social workers met the fishermen upon their arrival for debriefing.
The Philippines and Indonesia signed in May 2014 the Agreement on the Delimitation of the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) Boundary after 20 years of negotiations.
The agreement includes the annexed charts showing the EEZ boundary of the Philippines and Indonesia in the Mindanao Sea and Celebes Sea in the southern Philippines and in the Philippine Sea on the southern section of the Pacific Ocean.
It is the result of 20 years of negotiations to delimit the overlapping EEZs of the two countries.