People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (
Soong said that the recent controversy involving the legislators was due to the administration deliberately taking advantage of Liu's "slip of tongue."
Soong made the comments while campaigning for legislative candidates in Taipei yesterday.
President Chen Shui-bian (
The three made allegations recently that Chen had presented Moscoso with a US$1 million check as a birthday gift and "settlement fee" for an implied instance of sexual harassment.
Liu and Tsai originally made the allegations in an attempt to expose what they claimed was an improper exchange of money in the government's foreign relations.
"The best example of dollar diplomacy was when [former president] Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) donated money to support [Nelson] Mandela's African National Congress (ANC).
"Even worse, Lee got the money forwarded from a secret fund in the National Security Bureau," Soong said yesterday.
Soong was referring to the "Liu case controversy" in 2002, when it was revealed that Lee had agreed to donate US$10 million to the heavily indebted ANC in 1994 to maintain friendly South African-Taiwan ties.
The money was taken from a fund in the bureau, for which it was reimbursed.
"These things are true; they cannot sue me," Soong said.
Soong also emphasized yesterday the importance of the pan-blue camp winning a legislative majority in the upcoming elections.
He said that without a pan-blue win, financial corruption in the pan-green camp would run amok.
A major factor contributing to Soong's loss in the presidential election in 2000 were accusations from the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) that he had,during his time as the party's secretary general, illegally transferred more than NT$200 million in party funds to the bank accounts of his family members.
The incident is still under investigation. Soong has never adequately explained the money transfers.
Soong stumped for PFP, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and New Party candidates in Taipei and Changhua County yesterday.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
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