Two men arrested over an incident in which suitcases loaded with gasoline were planted on a high-speed train and near a lawmaker’s office have been released without charges, police said yesterday, adding that one of the devices could have emitted a cloud of poisonous gas.
The duo, brothers identified only by their surname Lai (賴), were arrested at their home in Greater Taichung on Sunday, but were released early yesterday morning after questioning, police said.
A police officer, who asked not to be named, said the pair had been ruled out as possible suspects.
Minister of the Interior Lee Hong-yuan (李鴻源) said he expected further arrests soon.
“My understanding is that police have collected sufficient information on the suspects. The police should be able to catch them soon,” Lee told reporters.
The incident happened on Friday, when two unattended suitcases were found on a high-speed rail train bound for Taipei.
Two other suitcases, also containing gasoline, were found outside Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lu Chia-chen’s (盧嘉辰) office in New Taipei City (新北市).
After discovering the two suitcases on the train, Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp (THSRC, 台灣高鐵) evacuated 600 passengers at Taoyuan Station and police removed the cases for investigation.
Officers searched the train for evidence and the platform for trains bound for Taipei was temporarily closed during the removal of the suitcases, the company said.
It said it had not received any threats prior to the incident.
A middle-aged man dressed in police rain gear is suspected of planting explosives outside Lu’s office, according to video footage released by the legislator’s office on Sunday.
Meanwhile, prosecutors said they had completed an analysis of the explosive devices found on the train and outside Lu’s office, and said that had they gone off, the devices would have emitted poison gas.
The devices were connected to materials with an alarm clock, using a wire as a conduit.
Police said the perpetrators may have attempted to ignite the gasoline to cause the gas to explode. The investigation also found that while the way the devices were made was nearly identical, the chemical compounds used in them were different. The device at Lu’s office was a simple explosive device.
The task force investigating the case said it had found an SUV it believed had been used by the suspects at a privately owned parking lot near Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport, adding that surveillance cameras at the parking lot had also recorded images of what seemed to be two men. The task force said the pair appeared to change clothes before they arrived at the airport on Friday night and that they had told the parking attendant they would return on April 19.
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
BEIJING’S ‘PAWN’: ‘We, as Chinese, should never forget our roots, history, culture,’ Want Want Holdings general manager Tsai Wang-ting said at a summit in China The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday condemned Want Want China Times Media Group (旺旺中時媒體集團) for making comments at the Cross-Strait Chinese Culture Summit that it said have damaged Taiwan’s sovereignty, adding that it would investigate if the group had colluded with China in the matter and contravened cross-strait regulations. The council issued a statement after Want Want Holdings (旺旺集團有限公司) general manager Tsai Wang-ting (蔡旺庭), the third son of the group’s founder, Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明), said at the summit last week that the group originated in “Chinese Taiwan,” and has developed and prospered in “the motherland.” “We, as Chinese, should never
‘A SURVIVAL QUESTION’: US officials have been urging the opposition KMT and TPP not to block defense spending, especially the special defense budget, an official said The US plans to ramp up weapons sales to Taiwan to a level exceeding US President Donald Trump’s first term as part of an effort to deter China as it intensifies military pressure on the nation, two US officials said on condition of anonymity. If US arms sales do accelerate, it could ease worries about the extent of Trump’s commitment to Taiwan. It would also add new friction to the tense US-China relationship. The officials said they expect US approvals for weapons sales to Taiwan over the next four years to surpass those in Trump’s first term, with one of them saying
INDO-PACIFIC REGION: Royal Navy ships exercise the right of freedom of navigation, including in the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, the UK’s Tony Radakin told a summit Freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific region is as important as it is in the English Channel, British Chief of the Defence Staff Admiral Tony Radakin said at a summit in Singapore on Saturday. The remark came as the British Royal Navy’s flagship aircraft carrier, the HMS Prince of Wales, is on an eight-month deployment to the Indo-Pacific region as head of an international carrier strike group. “Upholding the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and with it, the principles of the freedom of navigation, in this part of the world matters to us just as it matters in the