A group of former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration officials who have been proven innocent in corruption cases said yesterday that they planned to file charges against prosecutors of abuse of power.
The self-proclaimed “judicial victims” told a press conference that prosecutorial abuse had no place in a democracy and their cases reflected widespread political persecution after the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) return to power in 2008.
“Some prosecutors, who were a tool for the authoritarian regime in the Martial Law era and have kept serving those in power, were never held accountable for their malicious prosecutions and frivolous litigation,” said Wellington Koo (顧立雄), who was among more than 20 lawyers who volunteered for the movement, called “Seeking Justice in Taiwan.”
Organizers of the movement, including various civic groups and activists, listed at least 14 legal cases in which one or more former officials in the DPP administration were charged with corruption, but were ruled innocent.
The victims and lawyers listed three flaws in the current prosecution system — serious violations of prosecutorial obligations of fairness and impartiality, regular breaches of due judicial procedures, and a lack of checks and balances against prosecutors who abuse their power.
Those involved in the cases include former vice president Annette Lu (呂秀蓮), former Tainan mayor Hsu Tain-tsair (許添財), former deputy foreign minister Michael Kao (高英茂), former premier Yu Shyi-kun, former presidential office deputy secretary-general Chen Che-nan (陳哲男) and DPP Legislator Huang Wei-cher (黃偉哲), among others.
John Chen (陳傳岳), chief lawyer of the voluntary lawyer group, said they would file accusations, lawsuits or private prosecutions — depending on the circumstances of each case — to the district prosecutors’ offices as early as next week.
The lawyers had completed their reviews of five cases, which involved former presidential adviser Wu Li-pei (吳澧培), former legislator Wu Ming-min (吳明敏), former National Science Council deputy minister Hsieh Ching-chih (謝清志), Yunlin County Commissioner Su Chih-fen (蘇治芬) and Hsu, and planned to file a new lawsuit every week, Chen said.
The victims told the press conference that they had suffered enormously, despite having been ruled innocent, with Wu Li-pei saying that his integrity was questioned by his grandsons, while Wu Ming-min saying that the lawsuit had harmed his career and family.
“We talk about transitional justice a lot, but it cannot be done 20 or 30 years from now. It has to be done now. We cannot tolerate a continuing situation in Taiwan where there are always victims, but no perpetrators,” said Michelle Wang (王美琇), president of Friends of Beanstalk Association (綠色逗陣之友會), one of the organizers of the movement.
That was why the names of 17 prosecutors, including Prosecutor-General Huang Shih-ming (黃世銘), were listed on several signs shown to the media, which detailed prosecutors in charge of the allegedly unfair cases.
Lee Hung-hsi (李鴻禧), a law professor and a former presidential adviser, went so far as to describe the prosecutors as “social trash,” who sacrificed justice for their own careers and political ideology.
“To me, that also represents a failure in Taiwan’s law education and a law professor like myself must be responsible for the fact that more than 70 percent of people say they do not find our judicial system trustworthy,” Lee said.
LIMITS: While China increases military pressure on Taiwan and expands its use of cognitive warfare, it is unwilling to target tech supply chains, the report said US and Taiwan military officials have warned that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) could implement a blockade within “a matter of hours” and need only “minimal conversion time” prior to an attack on Taiwan, a report released on Tuesday by the US Senate’s China Economic and Security Review Commission said. “While there is no indication that China is planning an imminent attack, the United States and its allies and partners can no longer assume that a Taiwan contingency is a distant possibility for which they would have ample time to prepare,” it said. The commission made the comments in its annual
DETERMINATION: Beijing’s actions toward Tokyo have drawn international attention, but would likely bolster regional coordination and defense networks, the report said Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s administration is likely to prioritize security reforms and deterrence in the face of recent “hybrid” threats from China, the National Security Bureau (NSB) said. The bureau made the assessment in a written report to the Legislative Yuan ahead of an oral report and questions-and-answers session at the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee tomorrow. The key points of Japan’s security reforms would be to reinforce security cooperation with the US, including enhancing defense deployment in the first island chain, pushing forward the integrated command and operations of the Japan Self-Defense Forces and US Forces Japan, as
IN THE NATIONAL INTEREST: Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Francois Wu said the strengthening of military facilities would help to maintain security in the Taiwan Strait Japanese Minister of Defense Shinjiro Koizumi, visiting a military base close to Taiwan, said plans to deploy missiles to the post would move forward as tensions smolder between Tokyo and Beijing. “The deployment can help lower the chance of an armed attack on our country,” Koizumi told reporters on Sunday as he wrapped up his first trip to the base on the southern Japanese island of Yonaguni. “The view that it will heighten regional tensions is not accurate.” Former Japanese minister of defense Gen Nakatani in January said that Tokyo wanted to base Type 03 Chu-SAM missiles on Yonaguni, but little progress
NO CHANGES: A Japanese spokesperson said that Tokyo remains consistent and open for dialogue, while Beijing has canceled diplomatic engagements A Japanese official blasted China’s claims that Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has altered Japan’s position on a Taiwan crisis as “entirely baseless,” calling for more dialogue to stop ties between Asia’s top economies from spiraling. China vowed to take resolute self-defense against Japan if it “dared to intervene militarily in the Taiwan Strait” in a letter delivered Friday to the UN. “I’m aware of this letter,” said Maki Kobayashi, a senior Japanese government spokeswoman. “The claim our country has altered its position is entirely baseless,” she said on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Johannesburg on Saturday. The Chinese Ministry
RSS