The Ill-gotten Party Assets Settlement Committee yesterday issued a new freeze order on a Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) bank account after the Taipei High Administrative Court on Friday lifted a previous freeze on the account.
The committee in September ordered Bank SinoPac (永豐銀行) to freeze a KMT account and prohibited any cash withdrawals from the account unless a withdrawal request was made to fulfill “legal obligations” or serve “justifiable purposes” such as paying employees’ salaries.
The first freeze was issued to prohibit the party from disposing of assets presumed to have been obtained illegally.
Photo: Peter Lo, Taipei Times
However, the court ruled against that order, saying that the committee wrongly ordered SinoPac, a private organization without public authority, to enforce a vague administrative order, as the bank had no means to identify or verify the purpose of a withdrawal request.
The committee yesterday said that it will appeal the ruling and it issued another order freezing the SinoPac account, which specified that the committee has the authority to verify the purpose of a withdrawal request.
The committee also renewed an order asking the Bank of Taiwan (臺灣銀行), which issued 10 checks worth a total of NT$520 million (US$16.5 million) — the same amount that had been withdrawn from the SinoPac account — to place the uncashed checks on hold.
The KMT cashed one of the checks on Aug. 30, prior to the first freeze order, to pay employees’ salaries and pensions.
“However, we have to admit that it is beyond the committee’s jurisdiction if the KMT transfers the checks to a third person to cash them,” committee Chairman Wellington Koo (顧立雄) said. “The KMT might thus successfully transfer its assets. That is the law’s framework and limitations.”
He urged the public not to help the KMT cash the checks and warned the party that it would be subject to a fine of one to three times the amount of the cashed checks should it try to redeem them without the committee’s approval.
The KMT has to request the committee’s approval if it wants to access the money in the SinoPac account, while the bank should not permit a withdrawal request without the committee’s approval, Koo said.
The committee has also asked the KMT Party History Institute to provide archived documents about the party’s financial activities over the years to facilitate its investigations into the assets of the KMT and its affiliated organizations, Koo said.
KMT Administration and Management Committee director Chiu Da-chan (邱大展) told a news conference later in the day that the committee was treating the judicial system with contempt and was engaged in a mudslinging campaign against the KMT.
Recent remarks and actions by Koo suggested he has acted as an investigator, prosecutor and judge, which bodes ill for the nation, Chiu said.
“The KMT’s reform efforts will not be halted just because of the committee’s actions, but streamlining our structures necessitates large scale layoffs ... and the party needs financial support to reach its reform goals,” Chiu said.
The KMT would file an appeal against the committee’s new administrative injunctions and also an administrative suit against the new freeze on its bank account, Chiu said.
Additional reporting by Stacy Hsu
Taiwan has arranged for about 8 million barrels of crude oil, or about one-third of its monthly needs, to be shipped from the Red Sea this month to bypass the Strait of Hormuz and ease domestic supply pressures, CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) said yesterday. The state-run oil company has worked with Middle Eastern suppliers to secure routes other than the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 20 percent of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas typically passes, CPC chairman Fang Jeng-zen (方振仁) said at a meeting of the legislature’s Economics Committee in Taipei. Suppliers in Saudi Arabia have indicated they
South Korea has adjusted its electronic arrival card system to no longer list Taiwan as a part of China, a move that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said would help facilitate exchanges between the two sides. South Korea previously listed “Taiwan” as “Taiwan (China)” in the drop-down menus of its online arrival card system, where people had to fill out where they came from and their next destination. The ministry had requested South Korea make a revision and said it would change South Korea’s name on Taiwan’s online immigration system from “Republic of Korea” to “Korea (South),” should the issue not be
Tainan, Taipei and New Taipei City recorded the highest fines nationwide for illegal accommodations in the first quarter of this year, with fines issued in the three cities each exceeding NT$7 million (US$220,639), Tourism Administration data showed. Among them, Taipei had the highest number of illegal short-term rental units, with 410. There were 3,280 legally registered hotels nationwide in the first quarter, down by 14 properties, or 0.43 percent, from a year earlier, likely indicating operators exiting the market, the agency said. However, the number of unregistered properties rose to 1,174, including 314 illegal hotels and 860 illegal short-term rental
AIR ALERT: China’s reservation of airspace over the Yellow Sea and East China Sea could be an attempt to test the US’ response ahead of a Trump-Xi meeting, the NSB head said China’s attempts to infiltrate Taiwan are systematic, planned and targeted, with activity shifting from recruiting mid-level military officers to rank-and-file enlisted personnel, National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) said yesterday. The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) integrates national security, intelligence operations and “united front” efforts into a dense network to conduct intelligence gathering and espionage in Taiwan, Tsai said at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee. It uses specific networks to screen targets through exchange activities and recruiting local collaborators to establish intelligence-gathering organizations, he said. China is also shifting who it targets to lower-ranking military personnel,
RSS