A New Taipei City woman has been detained for allegedly colluding with a counterfeiting ring in China that forged Japanese yen, US dollars and Deutsche marks that could fool experts, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) announced yesterday.
“This is the largest currency counterfeiting case we have cracked in recent years,” Investigation Branch head Ruan Wen-chieh (阮文杰) said.
The 67-year-old women, surnamed Chen (陳), was apprehended yesterday and is being charged with breaches of the Smuggling Penalty Act (懲治走私條例) and securities forging offenses.
Photo: CNA
A raid of Chen’s residence in New Taipei City’s Yingge District (鶯歌) last week uncovered billions in forged bills — ￥228 million (US$2.05 million), US$3 million and 4 billion Deutsche marks (US$2.3 billion).
The bust was the result of cooperation between Taiwan and Japan, Ruan said, adding that in 2017, Japanese authorities told their Taiwanese counterparts about a Taiwanese woman who had been smuggling counterfeit Japanese yen to Okinawa.
“Our agency formed a task force and has been monitoring the case for more than one-and-a-half years,” Ruan added.
“It is very rare to see such sophisticated forgery of Japanese yen bills, because of the difficulties involved. The Japanese mint uses very special materials to create the paper for their currency and they add unique coloring agents that give a slight yellowish tone to the bills,” he added.
Whenever counterfeit bills were discovered in Japan, they would send their experts to Taiwan to examine the forgeries, he said.
Chen in 2012 set up a company for the smuggling operation and took trips to China to meet with a forgery ring, and would smuggle counterfeit Japanese yen on her return flight to Taiwan, investigators said.
Chen reportedly had a sales catalogue made up for her customers and also sold the forged bills to intermediaries, who profited by selling the fake bills or spending them at stores, they said.
Investigators estimate that Chen smuggled about ￥500 million in counterfeit yen from China to Taiwan over the years, saying that she allegedly sold about half of the bills for 15 to 20 percent of their face value.
“We believe that some customers transferred the counterfeit bills to other countries in Asia, while the fake US bills and Deutsche marks were sold in Japan, as they can serve as collateral for private loans there,” Ruan said.
The US government has signed defense cooperation agreements with Japan and the Philippines to boost the deterrence capabilities of countries in the first island chain, a report by the National Security Bureau (NSB) showed. The main countries on the first island chain include the two nations and Taiwan. The bureau is to present the report at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee tomorrow. The US military has deployed Typhon missile systems to Japan’s Yamaguchi Prefecture and Zambales province in the Philippines during their joint military exercises. It has also installed NMESIS anti-ship systems in Japan’s Okinawa
‘WIN-WIN’: The Philippines, and central and eastern European countries are important potential drone cooperation partners, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung said Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) in an interview published yesterday confirmed that there are joint ventures between Taiwan and Poland in the drone industry. Lin made the remark in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper). The government-backed Taiwan Excellence Drone International Business Opportunities Alliance and the Polish Chamber of Unmanned Systems on Wednesday last week signed a memorandum of understanding in Poland to develop a “non-China” supply chain for drones and work together on key technologies. Asked if Taiwan prioritized Poland among central and eastern European countries in drone collaboration, Lin
The Chien Feng IV (勁蜂, Mighty Hornet) loitering munition is on track to enter flight tests next month in connection with potential adoption by Taiwanese and US armed forces, a government source said yesterday. The kamikaze drone, which boasts a range of 1,000km, debuted at the Taipei Aerospace and Defense Technology Exhibition in September, the official said on condition of anonymity. The Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology and US-based Kratos Defense jointly developed the platform by leveraging the engine and airframe of the latter’s MQM-178 Firejet target drone, they said. The uncrewed aerial vehicle is designed to utilize an artificial intelligence computer
Renewed border fighting between Thailand and Cambodia showed no signs of abating yesterday, leaving hundreds of thousands of displaced people in both countries living in strained conditions as more flooded into temporary shelters. Reporters on the Thai side of the border heard sounds of outgoing, indirect fire yesterday. About 400,000 people have been evacuated from affected areas in Thailand and about 700 schools closed while fighting was ongoing in four border provinces, said Thai Rear Admiral Surasant Kongsiri, a spokesman for the military. Cambodia evacuated more than 127,000 villagers and closed hundreds of schools, the Thai Ministry of Defense said. Thailand’s military announced that
RSS