Taipei prosecutors this week will begin interviewing Presidential Office officials over the alleged embezzlement.
"The officials will be interviewed as witnesses starting this week," Eric Chen (
The Chinese-language United Daily News yesterday reported that a prosecutorial source said that investigators and the Ministry of Audit had discovered that around NT$15 million (US$458,100) in reimbursements for Pacific Sogo Department Store vouchers had been requested.
The report said the NT$15 million in vouchers were submitted for reimbursement from 2003 to last year.
The paper said that since first lady Wu Shu-jen (
Chen declined to comment on the news report.
Ministry of Audit Spokesman Wang Yung-hsing (王永興) yesterday told the press that the ministry had handed over documents related to the Presidential Office's reimbursement of expenditures from a "special allowance" fund to prosecutors, and the ministry would no longer comment on the matter.
The Ministry of Audit last week called for an investigation into allegations of embezzlement at the Presidential Office, saying it had received insufficient information to verify the legality of NT$48 million in expenditures from a secret Presidential Office slush fund.
Wang had said that documents related to the Presidential Office's reimbursement of expenditures from a "special allowance" fund last year contained irregularities.
The ministry had said that about 76.76 percent of the expenditures covered by the fund -- NT$48 million in total -- had not been reimbursed in conformity with the regulations.
According to the ministry's investigation, NT$47.9 million out of NT$48 million was spent last year, among which receipts for NT$24 million were classified and receipts for another NT$12.8 million were deemed unqualified for reimbursement.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Chiu Yi (
Those receipts were issued by the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Taipei, the Ambassador Hotel and Sogo Department Store, among others, Chiu alleged.
"We did find that some copies of the receipts Legislator Chiu provided to us had been used to reimburse expenditures from the fund, but we can't make public the amount, value or people who requested reimbursement," Wang said yesterday.
The inspection equipment and data transmission system for new robotic dogs that Taipei is planning to use for sidewalk patrols were developed by a Taiwanese company, the city’s New Construction Office said today, dismissing concerns that the China-made robots could pose a security risk. The city is bringing in smart robotic dogs to help with sidewalk inspections, Taipei Deputy Mayor Lee Ssu-chuan (李四川) said on Facebook. Equipped with a panoramic surveillance system, the robots would be able to automatically flag problems and easily navigate narrow sidewalks, making inspections faster and more accurate, Lee said. By collecting more accurate data, they would help Taipei
TAKING STOCK: The USMC is rebuilding a once-abandoned airfield in Palau to support large-scale ground operations as China’s missile range grows, Naval News reported The US Marine Corps (USMC) is considering new sites for stockpiling equipment in the West Pacific to harden military supply chains and enhance mobility across the Indo-Pacific region, US-based Naval News reported on Saturday. The proposed sites in Palau — one of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies — and Australia would enable a “rapid standup of stored equipment within a year” of the program’s approval, the report said, citing documents published by the USMC last month. In Palau, the service is rebuilding a formerly abandoned World War II-era airfield and establishing ancillary structures to support large-scale ground operations “as China’s missile range and magazine
A 72-year-old man in Kaohsiung was sentenced to 40 days in jail after he was found having sex with a 67-year-old woman under a slide in a public park on Sunday afternoon. At 3pm on Sunday, a mother surnamed Liang (梁) was with her child at a neighborhood park when they found the man, surnamed Tsai (蔡), and woman, surnamed Huang (黃), underneath the slide. Liang took her child away from the scene, took photographs of the two and called the police, who arrived and arrested the couple. During questioning, Tsai told police that he had met Huang that day and offered to
A British man was arrested for attempting to smuggle 14.37kg of marijuana into Taiwan through Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport, Taipei Customs said late yesterday. The man, who arrived from Bangkok at 9pm on Friday, was asked by customs officers to open his luggage during a random inspection, Taipei Customs said in a news release. The passenger, whose identity was not disclosed, refused to open his suitcase and tried to flee the restricted area. He was eventually subdued by three customs officials and an Aviation Police Bureau officer. A later search of his checked luggage uncovered 14.37kg of marijuana buds. The case was handed over
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