A Control Yuan task force looking into the Lafayette frigate scandal should release its report on the case within three days, an independent legislative candidate said yesterday.
The task force has completed its probe into the case, but says it won't release its report on the matter until after the Dec. 1 elections.
Roger Hsieh (
PHOTO: AFP
"I totally disagree with the task force's decision to postpone the release of the report until after the elections," Hsieh said.
"This is an issue that concerns national security and the death of a Taiwanese naval officer," the legislative candidate said. "It should be our first priority to figure out what's going on with this scandal. How can we wait until after the elections?"
Hsieh also questioned the role of the Control Yuan in the case, saying the investigation of the purchasing scandal was a job for the judiciary.
"I don't understand how the task force can investigate the scandal when it should be a job for prosecutors," he said.
Over the past year, a Control Yuan task force led by Kang Ning-hsiang (
On Nov. 3, Kang said the task force had finished its investigation and was prepared to release its report at any time. But a majority of the group's members decided to wait until after the elections.
"Now that Kang has said the task force has finished its investigation, we would like to ask them to release the report within three days," Hsieh said. "People have the right to know the truth ... don't they?"
Control Yuan member Lin Chu-liang (林鉅鋃), who accepted Hsieh's petition yesterday to have the report released, said the body wouldn't be influenced by political pressure in its work.
Kang said yesterday that task-force members would choose the best time to release the report.
"I can guarantee that we were not affected by any sort of political pressure," Kang said. "But we have to make sure everything is ready before we officially release the report, which is not now."
The Control Yuan task force has interviewed several key witnesses in the Lafayette frigate case, including former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝); Hau Pei-tsun (郝柏村), the former chief of the general staff who later became premier; Yeh Chang-tung (葉昌桐), a retired admiral and former naval commander-in-chief; and Lei Hsueh-ming (雷學明), a former vice admiral.
Task-force members have also been to France twice as a part of their investigation.
‘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
Taiwan yesterday denied Chinese allegations that its military was behind a cyberattack on a technology company in Guangzhou, after city authorities issued warrants for 20 suspects. The Guangzhou Municipal Public Security Bureau earlier yesterday issued warrants for 20 people it identified as members of the Information, Communications and Electronic Force Command (ICEFCOM). The bureau alleged they were behind a May 20 cyberattack targeting the backend system of a self-service facility at the company. “ICEFCOM, under Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party, directed the illegal attack,” the warrant says. The bureau placed a bounty of 10,000 yuan (US$1,392) on each of the 20 people named in
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
The High Court yesterday found a New Taipei City woman guilty of charges related to helping Beijing secure surrender agreements from military service members. Lee Huei-hsin (李慧馨) was sentenced to six years and eight months in prison for breaching the National Security Act (國家安全法), making illegal compacts with government employees and bribery, the court said. The verdict is final. Lee, the manager of a temple in the city’s Lujhou District (蘆洲), was accused of arranging for eight service members to make surrender pledges to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in exchange for money, the court said. The pledges, which required them to provide identification