After prosecutors on Thursday said they found classified government documents on computers from Wei Chuan Foods Corp (味全食品工業), the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus yesterday said that the documents were leaked by an agency of the Pingtung County Government, an allegation that was later confirmed by the county government, which said it did not know the documents were classified.
Changhua prosecutors requested an extension of the detention of the suspects in the Ting Hsin International Group (頂新國際集團) food scandal on Thursday night. Prosecutors said they suspected that those detained are likely to collude on their testimony if granted bail, citing the company’s ability to access classified government documents as proof of its “omnipotence.”
The documents were reported to be classified materials sent on Oct. 8 by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) to the Ministry of Health and Welfare informing the latter that the oil products Ting Hsin had bought from Vietnam-based manufacturer Dai Hanh Phuc Co (大幸福公司) were suspected to be substandard and urged Changhua’s and Pingtung’s health bureaus to launch investigations.
Photo: Chu Pei-hsiung, Taipei Times
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers yesterday morning criticized the health ministry for the leak and demanded that Minister of Health and Welfare Chiang Been-huang (蔣丙煌) provide an explanation.
Chiang said the ministry did not leak the documents, DPP Legislator Chen Ting-fei (陳亭妃) said.
At about the same time Chen was lashing out at the Ministry of Health and Welfare in the legislature, the KMT legislative caucus held a press conference saying that the leak was committed by an agency of the Pingtung County Government.
Photo: Lo Hsin-chen, Taipei Times
“I looked into the matter and found that the documents were leaked by a public office of the Pingtung County Government,” KMT caucus whip Alex Fai (費鴻泰) said, threatening to disclose the identity of the office if it failed to confess.
In addition to saying that the leak was from a DPP-governed local government, the KMT caucus attributed Ting Hsin’s food regulation violations to the pre-2008 DPP administration, saying that the corporation’s lawbreaking had “begun during the DPP era and was exposed in the KMT era.”
“Ting Hsin started to import Dai Hanh Phuc’s animal-feed-grade oil in 2007, when [former DPP chairman] Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) was the premier and [current DPP Chairperson] Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) was vice premier and doubled as a Consumer Protection Committee member,” Fai said. “Should they not be held accountable for [the scandal] as well?”
Calling the scandal “karma accumulated in [the nation’s] history,” Fai said both major parties are responsible for the group’s illegal actions.
In the immediate wake of the KMT allegations, the Pingtung County Government held a press conference in Pingtung, in which Pingtung County Deputy Commissioner Chung Chia-bing (鐘佳濱) and Health Bureau Inspector Tsai Ching-jung (蔡青蓉) said the documents were not specified as classified.
Chung said they received the documents on the night of Oct. 9, and Tsai faxed them to Ting Hsin, whose factory executive had asked for information about the substandard oil products in question.
Chung said that the agency had no idea that the forwarded documents were confidential until prosecutors started investigating bureau officials over the suspected leak and suspected corruption on Oct. 17.
Later yesterday, Tsai Ching-jung was subpoenaed by the Pingtung District Prosecutors’ Office. She was released after nearly an hour of questioning.
Separately yesterday, Pingtung County Commissioner Tsao Chi-hung (曹啟鴻), a member of the DPP, said he had faith in the integrity of his staff, adding that the Pingtung District Prosecutors’ Office confirmed that the official documents in question were not specified as classified.
It should be left to the prosecutors and the judiciary to adjudicate the case, Tsao said, calling on the KMT to stop what he called its political machinations and to focus on much-needed food safety.
Additional reporting by Lee Li-fa
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