Wu Shih-tsai (吳思材), a key suspect in the Papua New Guinea diplomatic fraud scandal, will be indicted soon, Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office Spokesman Lin Jinn-tsun (林錦村) said yesterday.
“Prosecutors still need some time to figure out where the stolen money — NT$1 billion [US$33 million] — is. But we will wrap up our investigation and indict Wu in the near future,” Lin said.
Lin said Chief Prosecutor Huang Mo-hsin (黃謀信), who is in charge of the investigation, had received a report from Singaporean prosecutors who investigated eight bank accounts belonging to Ching Chi-ju (金紀玖), the other main suspect. Singaporean prosecutors said they had found no evidence that any money from the eight accounts had been wired to Taiwanese officials.
The Singaporean report said that a total of US$19.8 million was deposited in the accounts and that Ching wired money from the accounts to Taiwan to buy real estate, cars and other investments, but he had never wired money to any Taiwanese officials.
Lin said prosecutors are also trying to determine if the case was linked to the money-laundering scandal enveloping former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁).
The fraud case surfaced in May when a Singaporean newspaper reported that the Singapore High Court had approved Taiwan’s application for an injunction to freeze a joint bank account held by Ching and Wu.
In August 2006, the 56-year-old Wu, a Singaporean, and Ching were commissioned by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and then-National Security Council (NSC) secretary-general Chiou I-jen (邱義仁) to act as intermediaries in an attempt to forge diplomatic relations with Papua New Guinea.
The ministry later agreed to wire US$30 million into Wu and Ching’s account at the OCBC Bank in Singapore to be transferred to the Papua New Guinea government after both countries had signed a diplomatic communique.
However, the two countries failed to form official ties and in December 2006 the ministry asked for its money back. Ching allegedly refused to return the funds and has since disappeared.
Chiou, former minister of foreign affairs James Huang (黃志芳) and former deputy minister of national defense Ko Cheng-heng (柯承亨) all resigned over their involvement in the plan.
Ching, who is a US citizen, is believed to be in the US, while Wu is in custody in Taiwan.
“China is preparing to invade Taiwan,” Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Francois Wu (吳志中) said in an exclusive interview with British media channel Sky News for a special report titled, “Is Taiwan ready for a Chinese invasion?” the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said today in a statement. The 25-minute-long special report by Helen Ann-Smith released yesterday saw Sky News travel to Penghu, Taoyuan and Taipei to discuss the possibility of a Chinese invasion and how Taiwan is preparing for an attack. The film observed emergency response drills, interviewed baseball fans at the Taipei Dome on their views of US President
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) today issued a "tsunami watch" alert after a magnitude 8.7 earthquake struck off the Kamchatka Peninsula in northeastern Russia earlier in the morning. The quake struck off the east coast of the Kamchatka Peninsula at 7:25am (Taiwan time) at a depth of about 19km, the CWA said, citing figures from the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center. The CWA's Seismological Center said preliminary assessments indicate that a tsunami could reach Taiwan's coastal areas by 1:18pm today. The CWA urged residents along the coast to stay alert and take necessary precautions as waves as high as 1m could hit the southeastern
ECONOMIC BENEFITS: The imports from Belize would replace those from Honduras, whose shrimp exports have dropped 67 percent since cutting ties in 2023 Maintaining ties with Taiwan has economic benefits, Ministry of Foreign Affairs officials said yesterday, citing the approval of frozen whiteleg shrimp imports from Belize by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as an example. The FDA on Wednesday approved the tariff-free imports from Belize after the whiteleg shrimp passed the Systematic Inspection of Imported Food, which would continue to boost mutual trade, the ministry said. Taiwan’s annual consumption of whiteleg shrimps stands at 30,000 tonnes, far exceeding domestic production, the ministry said. Taiwan used to fill the gap by importing shrimps from Honduras, but purchases slumped after Tegucigalpa severed diplomatic ties with Taiwan
The Executive Yuan yesterday approved a southwestern extension of the Sanying MRT Line from New Taipei to Bade District (八德) in Taoyuan, with a goal of starting construction by late 2026. The 4.03-kilometer extension, featuring three new stations, will run from the current terminus at Yingtao Fude Station (LB12) in New Taipei City to Dannan Station (LB14), where it will connect with Taoyuan’s Green Line, New Taipei City Metro Corp said in a statement. This extension will follow the completion of core Sanying Line, a 14.29-kilometer medium-capacity system linking Tucheng (土城), Sansia (三峽)
RSS