President Chen Shui-bian's
Chao, however, denied any wrongdoing or illegal act. He said he will face the investigation honestly and hopes the truth of the matter will be restored in the swiftest manner.
DPP spokesman Tsai Huang-liang (蔡煌瑯) yesterday issued a statement on behalf of the party that criticized Chao Chien-ming, his father Chao Yu-chu (趙玉柱) and his mother Chien Shui-mien's (簡水綿) "elusive attitude" toward the public.
"Chao Chien-ming is a DPP member and also the son-in-law of the president. He should be more discreet in his conduct and remarks than the general public," Tsai said. "Despite this, he attended banquets with some stock tycoons and failed to explain the whole thing at once, which inevitably aroused people's suspicions."
Whether the Chao family had done anything illegal would become clear after the law enforcement agency's investigation, Tsai said, but added that their "elusive attitude" toward the scandal had damaged the president's reputation and mired the DPP in chaos.
Tsai added that the insider trading allegations against the Chao family had eclipsed the president's diplomatic efforts.
"I would like to ask the Chaos whether they could face the president and say their behavior is worthy of the president's trust," Tsai said.
DPP Chairman Yu Shyi-kun yesterday said the DPP would continue to work and would not abandon reforms it has undertaken.
But DPP legislative whips and legislators expressed anger, saying the Chaos were not worthy of the DPP's coming to their defense.
"I'm really mad that President Chen's diplomatic efforts and hard work to improve the economy were immediately wiped out by the Chaos' insider trading scandal. I am not willing to defend some people's desire for wealth," DPP legislative whip Chen Chin-jun (陳景峻) said yesterday. "They just like to twist the law in order to obtain bribes. These people really owe us a big apology."
DPP Legislator Huang Wei-cher (
Meanwhile, the president yesterday said he supported the prosecutors' investigation into the matter and hoped the truth would be learned soon.
The Presidential Office issued a statement yesterday afternoon, which quoted Chen as saying that everyone should be treated equally before the law and that the matter was being handled accordingly.
Additional reporting by Ko Shu-ling
also see story:
Editorial: Chen's problems hurt us all
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
REVENGE TRAVEL: A surge in ticket prices should ease this year, but inflation would likely keep tickets at a higher price than before the pandemic Scoot is to offer six additional flights between Singapore and Northeast Asia, with all routes transiting Taipei from April 1, as the budget airline continues to resume operations that were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, a Scoot official said on Thursday. Vice president of sales Lee Yong Sin (李榮新) said at a gathering with reporters in Taipei that the number of flights from Singapore to Japan and South Korea with a stop in Taiwan would increase from 15 to 21 each week. That change means the number of the Singapore-Taiwan-Tokyo flights per week would increase from seven to 12, while Singapore-Taiwan-Seoul
POOR PREPARATION: Cultures can form on food that is out of refrigeration for too long and cooking does not reliably neutralize their toxins, an epidemiologist said Medical professionals yesterday said that suspected food poisoning deaths revolving around a restaurant at Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 Store in Taipei could have been caused by one of several types of bacterium. Ho Mei-shang (何美鄉), an epidemiologist at Academia Sinica’s Institute of Biomedical Sciences, wrote on Facebook that the death of a 39-year-old customer of the restaurant suggests the toxin involved was either “highly potent or present in massive large quantities.” People who ate at the restaurant showed symptoms within hours of consuming the food, suggesting that the poisoning resulted from contamination by a toxin and not infection of the
BAD NEIGHBORS: China took fourth place among countries spreading disinformation, with Hong Kong being used as a hub to spread propaganda, a V-Dem study found Taiwan has been rated as the country most affected by disinformation for the 11th consecutive year in a study by the global research project Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem). The nation continues to be a target of disinformation originating from China, and Hong Kong is increasingly being used as a base from which to disseminate that disinformation, the report said. After Taiwan, Latvia and Palestine ranked second and third respectively, while Nicaragua, North Korea, Venezuela and China, in that order, were the countries that spread the most disinformation, the report said. Each country listed in the report was given a score,