Taipei Chief Prosecutor Hsueh Wei-ping (薛維平) yesterday wanted to detain former China Development Holding Corp chairman Liu Tai-ying (劉泰英) on charges of embezzlement and money laundering, but the Taipei District Court decided to let Liu go because of a lack of evidence.
Liu, who is president of the Taiwan Research Institute, was first interrogated by special agents from the Ministry of Justice's Bureau of Investigation at around 9:30am on Friday. At about 4pm, special agents transferred him to the Taipei District Prosecutors' Office for another interrogation by Hsueh.
PHOTO: LUO PEI-DE, LIBERTY TIMES
By about midnight, Hsueh believed that there was a good chance that Liu would destroy pieces of evidence or exchange information with crucial witnesses and filed a detention request.
The Taipei District Court began to review Hsueh's detention request at around 4am yesterday but finally decided to release Liu without bail at 8:20am.
As he was walking out of the court building, Liu said that he had an agreement with the judges that he would not comment on the case in public.
"I am quite tired now. Please understand that I am not supposed to comment on the case outside the courtroom. I gave the judges my word," Liu said.
Hsueh is currently investigating the disappearance in 1994 of US$4.5 million from a secret fund of US$10.58 million to secure Taiwan's diplomatic relationship with South Africa.
According to his investigation, the National Security Bureau paid the amount to South Africa to secure the diplomatic relationship between two countries on behalf of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in May 1994.
On April 4, 1999, the ministry returned a total of US$10.7 million, including interest, to the bureau. The bureau's former chief accountant, Hsu Ping-chiang (
Liu Kuan-chun is wanted for allegedly embezzling more than NT$192 million from the total amount. According to the Bureau of Investigation, Liu left Taiwan on Sept. 3, 2000 and went to Shanghai. He surfaced in Bangkok in January last year and from there went to North America. Sources say that he is now in Canada.
Liu Tai-ying allegedly wired the money to Ruentex Corp Chairman Yin Yen-liang's (尹衍樑) bank accounts in the US and Singapore. Upon receiving the money, Yin allegedly wired it to one of the Ruentex Corp's bank accounts in Taiwan. Then, he "donated" US$3 million of it to the Taiwan Research Institute. However, prosecutors have not yet discovered the whereabouts of the missing US$4.5 million.
Hsu has been detained since July 18. In addition, prosecutors have also interrogated Yin, then-minister of foreign affairs Jason Hu (胡志強) and many other witnesses. According to Hsu's statement, he insisted that he acted on direct orders from former National Security Bureau secretary-general Yin Tsung-wen (殷宗文). The initial order allegedly came directly from former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝).
Yin Tsung-wen died of adenocarcinoma, a kind of lung cancer, on March 28 this year.
As a result, whether Lee was involved in or knew of the crime is another mystery which prosecutors are trying to figure out.
Hsueh said that prosecutors may summon Lee if necessary.
SECURITY: Starlink owner Elon Musk has taken pro-Beijing positions, and allowing pro-China companies to control Taiwan’s critical infrastructure is risky, a legislator said Starlink was reluctant to offer services in Taiwan because of the nation’s extremely high penetration rates in 4G and 5G services, the Ministry of Digital Affairs said yesterday. The ministry made the comments at a meeting of the legislature’s Transportation Committee, which reviewed amendments to Article 36 of the Telecommunications Management Act (電信管理法). Article 36 bans foreigners from holding more than 49 percent of shares in public telecommunications networks, while shares foreigners directly and indirectly hold are also capped at 60 percent of the total, unless specified otherwise by law. The amendments, sponsored by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Ko
The eastern extension of the Taipei MRT Red Line could begin operations as early as late June, the Taipei Department of Rapid Transit Systems said yesterday. Taipei Rapid Transit Corp said it is considering offering one month of free rides on the new section to mark its opening. Construction progress on the 1.4km extension, which is to run from the current terminal Xiangshan Station to a new eastern terminal, Guangci/Fengtian Temple Station, was 90.6 percent complete by the end of last month, the department said in a report to the Taipei City Council's Transportation Committee. While construction began in October 2016 with an
NON-RED SUPPLY: Boosting the nation’s drone industry is becoming increasingly urgent as China’s UAV dominance could become an issue in a crisis, an analyst said Taiwan’s drone exports to Europe grew 41.7-fold from 2024 to last year, with demand from Ukraine’s fight against Russian aggression the most likely driver of growth, a study showed. The Institute for Democracy, Society and Emerging Technology (DSET) in a statement on Wednesday said it found that many of Taiwan’s uncrewed aerial vehicle (UAV) sales were from Poland and the Czech Republic. These countries likely transferred the drones to Ukraine to aid it in its fight against the Russian invasion that started in 2022, it said. Despite the gains, Taiwan is not the dominant drone exporter to these markets, ranking second and fourth
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
RSS