Suspected Chinese spy Liao Hsien-ping (廖憲平), a former Taiwanese spy stationed in the Philippines, was arrested by special agents from the Bureau of Investigation late Tuesday night and detained after a Taoyuan court approved a request by prosecutors.
A bureau press release said that Liao, 60, had served as a special agent for the Military Intelligence Agency since graduation.
He was stationed in Manila until he was forced to retire because of involvement in fraud. He was convicted over the matter in 1995. After serving two years in a Philippine jail, Chinese security agents bailed him out and hired him as an agent. He went to Fujian Province for training, then moved back to Taiwan in 2000.
"He has been working as a cab driver, but he was actually collecting information for the Chinese authorities," a press release read. "His main job was to collect and tabulate information on Falun Gong members and their families in Taiwan."
The bureau's investigation showed that many Falun Gong members could not return to or enter China, Hong Kong or Macau because local authorities had received information from Liao and had placed them on a list of people to be refused entry.
The press release also mentioned that pro-Taiwan Hong Kong Legislator Liu Hui-ching (劉慧卿) was targeted by China because of Liao's work.
In addition to collecting information on his own accord, bureau agents said they discovered that two of Liao's former colleagues, retired Colonel Chang Tzu-hsin (張祖馨), and an employee at the National Police Agency's Immigration Office, Sung Wan-ling (宋婉玲), were involved in gathering information.
Taoyuan prosecutors also summoned them, with Chang and Sung admitting to helping Liao with his work. But prosecutors decided to release them after questioning.
According to the Taoyuan District Prosecutor's Office, the case was not serious enough to constitute a threat to the national security, but did qualify as an offense under the Criminal Code.
Prosecutors said Liao had received at least NT$1.7 million from the Chinese authorities for his information.
ALIGNED THINKING: Taiwan and Japan have a mutual interest in trade, culture and engineering, and can work together for stability, Cho Jung-tai said Taiwan and Japan are two like-minded countries willing to work together to form a “safety barrier” in the Indo-Pacific region, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday said at the opening ceremony of the 35th Taiwan-Japan Modern Engineering and Technology Symposium in Taipei. Taiwan and Japan are close geographically and closer emotionally, he added. Citing the overflowing of a barrier lake in the Mataian River (馬太鞍溪) in September, Cho said the submersible water level sensors given by Japan during the disaster helped Taiwan monitor the lake’s water levels more accurately. Japan also provided a lot of vaccines early in the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic,
Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) on Monday announced light shows and themed traffic lights to welcome fans of South Korean pop group Twice to the port city. The group is to play Kaohsiung on Saturday as part of its “This Is For” world tour. It would be the group’s first performance in Taiwan since its debut 10 years ago. The all-female group consists of five South Koreans, three Japanese and Tainan’s Chou Tzu-yu (周子瑜), the first Taiwan-born and raised member of a South Korean girl group. To promote the group’s arrival, the city has been holding a series of events, including a pop-up
TEMPORAL/SPIRITUAL: Beijing’s claim that the next Buddhist leader must come from China is a heavy-handed political maneuver that will fall flat-faced, experts said China’s requirement that the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation to be born in China and approved by Beijing has drawn criticism, with experts at a forum in Taipei yesterday saying that if Beijing were to put forth its own Dalai Lama, the person would not be recognized by the Tibetan Buddhist community. The experts made a remarks at the two-day forum hosted by the Tibet Religious Foundation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama titled: “The Snow Land Forum: Finding Common Ground on Tibet.” China says it has the right to determine the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation, as it claims sovereignty over Tibet since ancient times,
Temperatures in some parts of Taiwan are expected to fall sharply to lows of 15°C later this week as seasonal northeasterly winds strengthen, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. It is to be the strongest cold wave to affect northern Taiwan this autumn, while Chiayi County in the southwest and some parts of central Taiwan are likely to also see lower temperatures due to radiational cooling, which occurs under conditions of clear skies, light winds and dry weather, the CWA said. Across Taiwan, temperatures are to fall gradually this week, dropping to 15°C to 16°C in the early hours of Wednesday
RSS