After former National Security Bureau (NSB) cashier Liu Kuan-chun (劉冠軍) allegedly escaped the country with embezzled government funds, the PFP did not condemn Liu's flight or demand that the allegations of treason and endangering national security be investigated. Indeed, the PFP is justifiably suspected of conspiring with Liu to further leak additional national security secrets by handing classified documents to the China Times, Next magazine and the Singtao Daily for publication. Such conduct would in itself constitute an illegal disclosure of intelligence. It not only jeopardizes the nation's security and friendships, but has also trampled all over our sacred press freedom.
The release of a Control Yuan report on the scandal involving Taiwan's purchase from France of six Lafayette-class frigates shocked many. The complications and chaos surrounding the Navy's purchase of these frigates highlight the difficulties faced by Taiwan in the international community. Under the "one China" policies of both China and France, many shameful events took place in connection with the purchase.
Under a Feb. 1, 1993 contract, the Lafayette-class frigates sold by France were to have been assembled by China Ship Building Corporation (CSBC, 中船公司) in Taiwan. Moreover, because of tremendous pressure from China, the original contract only provided for the sale of the frigates' and their engines, without any arms, surveillance equipment, or combat-management systems.
In March 1993, however, Navy General Headquarters unexpectedly notified CSBC to stop the assembly work, creating a major financial loss for the company. The Taiwan and French governments had decided to have the French assemble all six frigates instead. That same month, Yin Ching-feng (
On Dec. 8, 1993, representatives from French shipmaker Thomson CSF (now known as Thales) visited Navy General Headquarters to provide a briefing on the frigates' electronic combat system. The next day, Yin disappeared and was later found dead.
Shortly afterwards, on Dec. 20, Andrew Wang (
The Control Yuan report asked the Prosecutor's Office of the Supreme Military Court to investigate the chief of the general staff at the time, Hao Pei-tsun (
The ministry's refusal to work with the Control Yuan is truly baffling. The investigation of a crime is an exercise of executive power, while the trying of a case is one of judicial power. The investigative power of the prosecutor's office in the Supreme Military Court is not equivalent to the power to try cases. The refusal has prompted even more uproar.
On the day that the Control Yuan forwarded its report to the prosecutor's office for further investigation, the China Times published confidential documents from the NSB's Fengtian (奉天) special account. The NSB notified the prosecutor's office of the Supreme Court that the Next was about to publish even more confidential documents on the account, in violation of Article 109 of the Criminal Code.
Article 109 makes disclosure or delivery of confidential security documents, among other items, an offense against the external security of the state. The prosecutor's office obtained three search warrants from the Taiwan High Court. A search was then conducted of Next's premises, its printing facilities and the residence of a Next senior reporter Hsieh Zhong-liang (謝忠良).
The TSU suspects that PFP Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) is the mastermind behind the exposure of the secret NSB accounts. It argues that Soong obtained the computer disks containing the secret files from Liu and then forwarded them to the media. He may have also passed the information to Beijing's propaganda unit on unification, the TSU says. The TSU believes that the PFP is a co-conspirator and is therefore also criminally liable.
If this is so, then the PFP's hope was nothing less than to destroy former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) by exposing the secret accounts. Conduct of this nature would demonstrate that the PFP is not loyal to the ROC, its president, or its people. It is more like a propaganda machine for China in Taiwan.
After the PFP obtained the stolen confidential documents, it should have immediately notified the police. Instead, it appears to have turned them over to the media. TSU Legislative Caucus Convener Hsu Deng-kung (許登宮) alleges that Soong not only knew about, but probably spearheaded, the entire scheme under which PFP Legislator Diane Lee (李慶安) exposed the secret accounts. Hsu also demanded that law enforcement officials immediately seize any and all computer disks and relevant confidential documents that the PFP might have in regard to the accounts.
At the same time, DPP Legislator Chiou Yi-ying (邱議瑩) also attacked the PFP's possession and exposure of the documents as illegal. It wasn't until then that Diane Lee finally said she had already handed the documents over to the prosecutor general.
The NSB scandal shows that despite the transfer of power to the DPP, Taiwan has failed to develop a culture of political neutrality under which civil servants and the military owe their loyalty to the country, rather than to a party, namely, the KMT. Those in the military remain unable to fully identify with their commander-in-chief, the president. As a result, politics prevails over the rule of law, and political parties command politics.
Prosecutors should seek to establish from whom and when Diane Lee obtained the documents and why she decided to forward them to the media. They should, moreover, find out when she turned over the documents to the prosecutor. There is no need to organize another investigative committee at the legislature that will simply distort underlying criminal liability.
In responding to inquiries about the case, former president Lee has carefully tried to avoid the further disclosure of security information. TSU Chairman Huang Chu-wen (黃主文) has said that Lee has stated that all moneys in the secret accounts were used to ensure the country's survival and that not one penny made its way into his own pocket.
Huang quoted Lee as saying that, "Without these secret ac-counts, it would have been difficult to promote [Taiwan's] pragmatic diplomacy and respond to China's elbowing."
Even some KMT lawmakers quoted newspapers in pointing out that Lee provided US$11 million as foreign aid to South Africa in order to help maintain diplomatic ties. Before the two countries broke relations, South Africa's then-president Nelson Mandela visited Taiwan to negotiate in secret about continuing ties in exchange for more aid from Taiwan. Both Frederick Chien (錢復) and Yin Tsung-wen (殷宗文), the minister of foreign affairs and NSB secretary-general at the time, must have realized that expenses for pragmatic diplomacy could not have come from regular foreign affairs budgets. They could only have been paid from secret accounts.
Moreover, it was not Lee who set up these secret accounts. Lee became president in January 1989. The accounts were set up in 1979, when Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國) was president. At the time, China was making every effort to im-pede Taiwan's foreign relations. Countries holding diplomatic relations with Taiwan were pressured into severing their recognition of Taipei and accepting the "one China" principle. These secret accounts were used to help save Taiwan's international status. It is inconceivable that neither the KMT nor the PFP today can't understand their purpose.
Political instability today arises solely out of a division among the Taiwan people over their national identity. Less than 20 percent of the public, primarily ethnic mainlanders, see China as their present or future country, while 80 percent recognize that Taiwan is their present and future country. The latter agree with Lee' Teng-hui's notion of a "special state-to-state relationship" between Taiwan and China. In other words, Taiwan is already sovereign and independent of China. This is also the fundamental position of the ruling party.
After the KMT was relegated to the position of opposition party, the PFP split from it. The two parties resent former president Lee for announcing the existence of a "special state-to-state" relationship. They have also failed to accept President Chen Shui-bian's (
In the two years since Chen took office, not a day of political peace has been felt in Taiwan. This prevents the ruling party from implementing its policies effectively and doing good for the country. The opposition's intent is to make Chen a lame-duck president during his four years in office. By doing so, they believe that the KMT and the PFP will stand a good chance of winning the 2004 presidential election, thus paving the way for the implementation of "one country, two systems" in Taiwan.
Lee Chang-kuei is the president of the Taipei Times and a professor emeritus at National Taiwan University.
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