About 10,000 black-clad gangsters, friends and family took part in the funeral of veteran gangster Hsu Hai-ching (
"Police videotaped those alleged gangsters to look into whether they have violated the Organized Crime Prevention Act under the criminal code," Lin Pang-liang (林邦樑), spokesman for the Taipei District Prosecutors' Office said yesterday.
Hsu's funeral service was held at Taipei First Municipal Mortuary at around noon yesterday as thousands of local gangsters and members of crime syndicates from Hong Kong and Japan formed a line to pay their respects to the Taiwan's notorious "godfather" Hsu.
PHOTO: SEAN CHAO, TAIPEI TIMES
The service was a veritable family reunion for Taiwan's criminal underworld. Members represented gangs such as the infamous Bamboo Union (
Taipei City Council Speaker Wu Bi-chu (
The head of the Taiwanese Entertainment Union, Yang Kuang-you (
The funeral began at 12:30pm and drew to a close at 2:30pm. After the funeral service, Hsu's ashes were brought to Taipei County's Chinpaosan cemetery. Thousands of gangsters walked behind Hsu's hearse in a procession that stretched for about 10km along Minquan E. Rd, temporarily blocking traffic. Hundreds of family members and gang members waited at the cemetery for the funeral procession to arrive.
Police set up roadblocks around the cemetery. They also said the funeral services affected the surrounding area, and inconvenienced the nearly 50,000 junior high school graduates in the city who were taking their high school entrance exams yesterday.
Born in 1913, Hsu was a first-generation Taiwanese who got involved in organized crime after the KMT came to Taiwan. He was best known by the nick names "Mosquito Brother" and "the Great Arbitrator." He was also one of the first gangsters to enter Taiwan's political arena by becoming a Taipei City councilor in 1950.
Hsu died on April 6 at the age of 93.
A preclearance service to facilitate entry for people traveling to select airports in Japan would be available from Thursday next week to Feb. 25 at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport, Taoyuan International Airport Corp (TIAC) said on Tuesday. The service was first made available to Taiwanese travelers throughout the winter vacation of 2024 and during the Lunar New Year holiday. In addition to flights to the Japanese cities of Hakodate, Asahikawa, Akita, Sendai, Niigata, Okayama, Takamatsu, Kumamoto and Kagoshima, the service would be available to travelers to Kobe and Oita. The service can be accessed by passengers of 15 flight routes operated by
MORE FALL: An investigation into one of Xi’s key cronies, part of a broader ‘anti-corruption’ drive, indicates that he might have a deep distrust in the military, an expert said China’s latest military purge underscores systemic risks in its shift from collective leadership to sole rule under Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), and could disrupt its chain of command and military capabilities, a national security official said yesterday. If decisionmaking within the Chinese Communist Party has become “irrational” under one-man rule, the Taiwan Strait and the regional situation must be approached with extreme caution, given unforeseen risks, they added. The anonymous official made the remarks as China’s Central Military Commission Vice Chairman Zhang Youxia (張又俠) and Joint Staff Department Chief of Staff Liu Zhenli (劉振立) were reportedly being investigated for suspected “serious
ENHANCING EFFICIENCY: The apron can accommodate 16 airplanes overnight at Taoyuan airport while work on the third runway continues, the transport minister said A new temporary overnight parking apron at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport is to start operating on Friday next week to boost operational efficiency while the third runway is being constructed, the Ministry of Transportation and Communications said yesterday. The apron — one of the crucial projects in the construction of the third runway — can accommodate 16 aircraft overnight at the nation’s largest international airport, Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) told reporters while inspecting the new facility yesterday morning. Aside from providing the airport operator with greater flexibility in aircraft parking during the third runway construction,
Taiwanese and US defense groups are collaborating to introduce deployable, semi-autonomous manufacturing systems for drones and components in a boost to the nation’s supply chain resilience. Taiwan’s G-Tech Optroelectronics Corp subsidiary GTOC and the US’ Aerkomm Inc on Friday announced an agreement with fellow US-based Firestorm Lab to adopt the latter’s xCell, a technology featuring 3D printers fitted in 6.1m container units. The systems enable aerial platforms and parts to be produced in high volumes from dispersed nodes capable of rapid redeployment, to minimize the risk of enemy strikes and to meet field requirements, they said. Firestorm chief technology officer Ian Muceus said
RSS