Following the discovery of the mistrial of Chiang Kuo-ching (江國慶), who confessed to a sexual assault allegedly after torture in 1996 and was executed the following year, some Control Yuan members yesterday called for a law revision to extend their power to intervene in similar cases in the future.
“If the Control Yuan had the ad-hoc power of investigation, we could have prevented such a mistrial, because there had been rumors that torture was involved at the time,” Control Yuan member Ma Yi-kung (馬以工) told a news conference at the legislature.
Ma went to the legislature to ask Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Ting Shou-chung (丁守中) for help in pushing for law revisions to give the Control Yuan more power.
Under the current system, the Control Yuan can only investigate the wrongdoing of public servants after the fact.
Chiang’s case took place in 1996 when he was serving in the air force. He was accused of sexually assaulting a young girl and was executed after he confessed to the crime.
However, in letters to his parents, Chiang said that he only confessed to the crime after he was tortured, adding that the military promised that it would try to “save” his life if he confessed.
Since then, Chiang’s family has been trying to prove his innocence, but their efforts were in vain until last month, when Hsu Jung-chou (許榮洲), another serviceman in the air force, confessed to the crime and evidence supported Hsu’s testimony.
Hsu had actually confessed to the crime in 1996, but was not taken seriously by the military prosecutor.
Another Control Yuan member, Shen Mei-chen (沈美真), who went to the legislature with Ma, said that the current system puts excessive limits on Control Yuan members’ powers.
“There’s no law penalizing -retired public servants who refuse to come to the Control Yuan for questioning when we request them to do so,” Shen said. “Take Chiang’s case for example; we asked several retired military officers who were involved in the case at the time to come talk to us, but they didn’t come and there’s nothing we can do about it.”
She added that lack of manpower was also an obstacle for Control Yuan members trying to probe cases.
Ting gave his full support to the two Control Yuan members’ proposal and said that the time limits on Control Yuan members investigating wrongdoing by public servants should be extended.
In Chiang’s case, Ting said, the Control Yuan cannot take further action because it happened over 10 years ago because they can only trace back wrongdoings by public servants as far as 10 years.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Huang Wei-cher (黃偉哲) had reservations about the proposed revision.
“I think we should be more cautious about making such changes in the law, because it’s the judiciary that should be in charge of investigating such cases or allegations of torture,” Huang told the press. “If the Control Yuan extends its power, it may be interfering with the judiciary. And what if it closes a case with a totally different conclusion from the judiciary’s?”
Based on the principle of separation of power, Huang also thinks the Control Yuan has enough manpower for what it’s supposed to do.
“There are more than 2,000 judges and prosecutors across the country versus 29 Control Yuan members — do you really think they could do a much better job than the judiciary if given more manpower?” Huang said. “Control Yuan members should focus on what they are supposed to do now, and not ask for more power.”
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater