Ni Zichuan (倪子川), a 53-year-old Chinese official with the Political Consultative Taiwanese, Hong Kong and Macao Overseas Chinese Liaison Committee in Quanzhou, Fujian Province, was caught shoplifting from a supermarket near his hotel in Hsinchu on Friday.
Ni was found to have stolen skincare products worth just NT$99 on two separate occasions. The manager of the supermarket said the police were brought in and the suspect was sent to the Hsinchu District Prosecutors’ Office.
Prosecutors, however, felt that the crime was not very serious and Ni was set free. They took into account mitigating circumstances, such as the fact that the accused admitted his crimes and had come to an agreement with the store manager.
Criticizing the authorities, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Tsai Huang-liang (蔡煌瑯) said yesterday that this was just the latest example of Chinese officials being let off after a brush with the law in Taiwan. The last incident involved a Chinese tourist taking surreptitious photos of a military facility.
Tsai said it was symptomatic of law enforcement’s servile and obsequious attitude when it comes to Chinese breaking the law in Taiwan.
Intelligence services became interested in the case after it was suggested that Ni was the director of a Taiwan affairs office in China, but it was later clarified that his position was at the provincial or metropolitan level.
Further investigations revealed that Ni was director of the office.
The National Immigration Agency said Ni had applied to enter Taiwan as a tourist and had been granted a one-month visa. He did not include information about his occupation on the application.
Maa Shaw-chang (馬紹章), a spokesman for the Straits Exchange Foundation, said the case was currently under investigation and that appropriate measures would be taken.
Ni faced the media on Friday, producing his Chinese ID to prove his identity. He said he had been a public servant for 30 years and had been in his current position as director of the Fengze District local office for more than three years.
Ni said that he had come to Taiwan with a 16-member group, including seven entrepreneurs in the fields of handicrafts and logistics, looking for business opportunities. They arrived on May 3 and were to leave on Tuesday.
Commenting on the case, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Hsieh Kuo-liang (謝國樑) said he believed prosecutors had acted correctly.
Hsieh said the prosecutors’ decision was in line with the principle of exemption from petty criminal prosecutions enshrined in the Criminal Code.
“If this happened to a Taiwanese citizen, I believe they would also be released. If the Chinese official stole an item valued at more than NT$20,000 he would have been detained, but NT$198 is OK,” Hsieh said.
KMT Legislator Lu Hsueh-chang (呂學樟) said prosecutors did not compromise the nation’s judicial jurisdiction as “it was the prosecutors’ decision [not to charge him]. It was not determined by the Chinese government.”
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY SHIH HSIU-CHUAN,TSENG WEI-CHEN AND SU YUNG-YAO
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