The National Security Bureau (NSB) yesterday ruled out an armed confrontation between Taiwan and China anytime soon.
But the situation could change after a summit meeting of Chinese leaders from both the civil and military sectors in August, officials from the NSB said.
Before then the Chinese military is unlikely to take any action against Taiwan even if they are going ahead with large-scale military exercises across the Taiwan Strait, they said.
The NSB made its announcement to members of the defense committee of the legislature yesterday during a closed-door session.
Leaders of the local intelligence community, including NSB director General Ting Yu-chou (丁渝洲) and Military Intelligence Bureau director Lieutenant General Hsu Chu-sheng (徐筑生), attended the meeting.
On the morning of the all-day session, a former intelligence agent made a surprise appearance at the committee. He appealed for an inquiry into the high profile spying case which involved the execution of two high-ranking officials from the People's Liberation Army (PLA).
The head-to-head discussion by former agent Chang Chih-peng (張志鵬) and NSB leaders was arranged by Li Chin-hua (李慶華), of the PFP.
Chang claimed to have helped the country obtain top-secret information about China's M-class ballistic missiles with the assistance of PLA Major General Liu Lienkun (
At a press conference held in the lead-up to the March 18 presidential election, Chang alleged that his intelligence sources Liu and Shao were discovered and executed by the PLA because of a slip of tongue by then president Lee Teng-hui (
Lee spoke at the time of the "dummy" nature of the M-class missiles which China lobbed into waters off Taiwan in 1996.
At yesterday's legislature meeting, Chang called on intelligence leaders to compensate the surviving family members of the two PLA officials and bring home two other agents who were either arrested or fled to a foreign country after their identities were exposed.
Chang also asked for financial compensation to make up for property losses which resulted from the exposure of his intelligence operation in China.
Both intelligence chiefs, Ting and Hsu, received Chang in such a way as to suggest they recognized him as a former service member.
But neither made any direct response to Chang's requests, promising instead to think about some of them.
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