The Control Yuan yesterday impeached eight former customs officials and 16 other staff members allegedly involved in one of the biggest corruption cases ever to involve the nation’s custom officials.
Control Yuan member Huang Huang-hsiung (黃煌雄) said the impeachment was unprecedented in terms of the number of officials impeached at the same time.
Among the eight former officials were deputy head of the Directorate-General of Customs Lu Tsai-yih (呂財益) — the highest-ranking official, former Keelung Customs Office director Tsai Chiu-chi (蔡秋吉) and former director of the Department of Valuation at the Directorate-General of Customs Shih Chung-mei (史中美).
The eight ex-officials, along with 16 others, were indicted by prosecutors in December on charges that they had been taking bribes from customs brokers and traders for two years, in exchange for their assistance in importing banned products and evading tariffs.
Control Yuan members found that Lu, Tsai and Shih were also allegedly involved in various irregularities like reshuffling personnel, leaking internal documents or telling subordinates to do certain things to help those who bribed them.
The trio claimed innocence when they were questioned by Control Yuan members, but the Control Yuan members had found that Chang Sheng-tai (張勝泰) acted as middleman and worked hand in glove with the trio to negotiate with traders and brokers, Huang said.
The eight officials are scheduled to be referred to the Public Functionary Disciplinary Sanction Commission at the Judicial Yuan for punishment.
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
STATS: Taiwan’s average life expectancy of 80.77 years was lower than that of Japan, Singapore and South Korea, but higher than in China, Malaysia and Indonesia Taiwan’s average life expectancy last year increased to 80.77 years, but was still not back to its pre-COVID-19 pandemic peak of 81.32 years in 2020, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday. The average life expectancy last year increased the 0.54 years from 2023, the ministry said in a statement. For men and women, the average life expectancy last year was 77.42 years and 84.30 years respectively, up 0.48 years and 0.56 years from the previous year. Taiwan’s average life expectancy peaked at 81.32 years in 2020, as the nation was relatively unaffected by the pandemic that year. The metric
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
RSS