Minister of National Defense Kao Hua-chu (高華柱) yesterday said he would complete a probe into an alleged power struggle within the Military Intelligence Agency within two weeks.
During a question-and-answer session with Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕), Kao said the military had launched an investigation into corruption allegations against agency director-general Ker Kuang-ming (葛廣明), who stepped down on Sunday, and the alleged power struggle.
“Judging from what we have found so far, we need to straighten things out [at the agency]. Since some people believe there were [corruption] problems with the director-general, we have reshuffled positions,” Kao said.
Lu voiced concerns about an alleged power struggle within the agency after the Ministry of National Defense replaced Ker with Deputy Director of the National Security Bureau’s Secret Service Center Chang Kan-ping (張堪平) on Sunday.
The Chinese-language United Daily News yesterday alleged that Ker’s replacement was the result of a battle between him and the agency’s deputy director Liu Pen-shan (劉本善).
The story said a note accusing Ker of embezzlement, negligence of duty, corruption and violation of military codes was sent to military prosecutors and legislators.
The story also quoted Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chai Trong-rong (蔡同榮) as saying that Ker had allegedly used public funds to benefit relatives and close aides.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods