Former vice president Annette Lu (呂秀蓮) and former Presidential Office secretary-general Yu Shyi-kun (游錫堃) were found not guilty by the Taipei District Court yesterday of using fraudulent receipts to claim state affairs funds during their stint in the Presidential Office.
The Taipei District Court said that given their positions in the government, Lu and Yu were busy with public affairs and left using receipts to claim fund reimbursements to their aides.
No evidence had been provided that showed Lu and Yu knew about reimbursements from the fund, the court said.
Meanwhile, in a separate case in which Lu, Yu and former minister of foreign affairs Mark Chen (陳唐山) were charged with using fraudulent receipts to claim special allowance funds, the court yesterday also found them not guilty.
The district court said that because the legislature last year approved a law under which officials cannot be prosecuted for suspicious reimbursements from special allowance funds that took place before Dec. 31, 2006, the charges against the three had been dropped.
However, the court did find four of Lu’s aides and two of Yu’s aides guilty of forgery. The six were granted probation.
Yangmingshan National Park authorities yesterday urged visitors to respect public spaces and obey the law after a couple was caught on a camera livestream having sex at the park’s Qingtiangang (擎天崗) earlier in the day. The Shilin Police Precinct in Taipei said it has identified a suspect and his vehicle registration number, and would summon him for questioning. The case would be handled in accordance with public indecency charges, it added. The couple entered the park at about 11pm on Thursday and began fooling around by 1am yesterday, the police said, adding that the two were unaware of the park’s all-day live
Fast food chain McDonald's is to raise prices by up to NT$5 on some products at its restaurants across Taiwan, starting on Wednesday next week, the company announced today. The prices of all extra value meals and sharing boxes are to increase by NT$5, while breakfast combos and creamy corn soup would go up by NT$3, the company said in a statement. The price of the main items of those meals, if ordered individually, would remain the same. Meanwhile, the price of a medium-sized lemon iced tea and hot cappuccino would rise by NT$3, extra dipping sauces for chicken nuggets would go up
Yangmingshan National Park’s Qingtiangang (擎天崗) nature area has gone viral after a park livestream camera observed a couple in the throes of intimate congress, which was broadcast live on YouTube, drawing large late-night crowds and sparking a backlash over noise, bright lights and disruption to wildlife habitat. The area’s livestream footage appeared to show a couple engaging in sexual activity on a picnic table in the park on Friday last week, with the uncensored footage streamed publicly online. The footage quickly spread across social media, prompting a tide of visitors to travel to the site to “check in” and recreate the
Minister of Digital Affairs Lin Yi-ching (林宜敬) yesterday cited regulatory issues and national security concerns as an expert said that Taiwan is among the few Asian regions without Starlink. Lin made the remarks on Facebook after funP Innovation Group chief executive officer Nathan Chiu (邱繼弘) on Friday said Taiwan and four other countries in Asia — China, North Korea, Afghanistan and Syria — have no access to Starlink. Starlink has become available in 166 countries worldwide, including Ukraine, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam, in the six years since it became commercial, he said. While China and North Korea block Starlink, Syria is not