The parallel investigations by Taiwan and the Philippines into the fatal shooting of Taiwanese fisherman Hung Shih-cheng (洪石成) by Philippine Coast Guard personnel on May 9 are intended to produce results both sides can agree on, Deputy Minister of Justice Chen Ming-tang (陳明堂) said yesterday.
If the Philippines concludes its report based on the evidence found during the course of its investigation, once Taiwan completes its investigation then Taipei and Manila will have arrived at a consensus on the circumstances leading to the shooting, Chen said at a legislative committee meeting.
“Based on the rules of evidence-gathering and analysis, there can be only one truth,” Chen said.
Minister of Foreign Affairs David Lin (林永樂) said that under no circumstance could Philippine judicial personal deny that Philippine Coast Guard personnel applied excessive force against the Kuang Ta Hsing No. 28 that Hung was on because Taiwanese prosecutors have found 59 bullet holes riddling the fishing boat.
The Philippines and Taiwan yesterday started what Manila has termed a “parallel investigation” into the incident, with a team from the Philippine National Bureau of Investigation arriving in Taiwan yesterday and a group of Taiwanese investigators departing for Manila.
At a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, Chen said Taiwan termed the way both sides work together to discover the truth behind the shooting as a “cooperative investigation.”
Following days of negotiation, Taipei and Manila agreed that they would discuss the findings of their respective investigations before releasing the reports, Chen Ming-tang said in response to a question from Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁).
Taipei and Manila will release separate reports, but the results of their probes should be the same, Chen Ming-tang said.
Chen Ming-tang said that the Taiwanese investigative team, led by Lin Yen-liang (林彥良), met with National Bureau of Investigation Director Nonnatus Caesar Rojas at 11am yesterday to finalize the team’s itinerary during their stay in Manila.
Immediately after the meeting, the team initiated their investigation by conducting a ballistics test, Chen Ming-tang said.
The Taiwanese team is to inspect the Philippine vessel involved in the incident today and they are scheduled to review video footage of the shooting and interrogate witnesses and suspects tomorrow, he said.
‘LONE WOLF’: The suspect was difficult to locate, as he did not use a cellphone, did not contact family and often lived in abandoned sites or parks, police said Taipei police on Thursday morning arrested a man accused of numerous burglaries and at least 14 incidents of sexual assault spanning more than 20 years, in what might be the nation’s most notorious crime spree in recent years. Sixty-year-old Tu Ming-lang (涂明朗) — who was yesterday placed in judicial detention, after a judge determined he was a flight risk without a fixed address — faces multiple charges of sexual assault and burglary, police said. A task force comprised of various law enforcement agencies arrested Tu as part of an investigation into an April 28 burglary in Daan District (大安), in which a
The majority of parents surveyed in northern Taiwan favor the suspension of all on-site classes at schools from the junior-high level and below amid a surge in domestic COVID-19 infections, parent groups said yesterday. About 84.4 percent of respondents in a survey of 2,912 parents in northern Taiwan, where the outbreak is the most serious, said they supported suspending classes, the Action Alliance on Basic Education, the Taiwan Parents Protect Women and Children Association, and the Taiwan Love Children Association said. The groups distributed questionnaires to parents in New Taipei City, Taipei, Keelung, Taoyuan and Hsinchu city and county from Saturday morning
ASEAN BATTLEGROUND: Japan and Australia could be drawn into Pacific tensions as China sets its sights on the Diaoyutai Islands and further beyond the first island chain Tensions between China and the US in the Indo-Pacific region are expected to intensify, the National Security Bureau and Ministry of Foreign Affairs said, recommending that Taiwan continue to emphasize its shared values and interests to encourage resistance to Chinese aggression. US commitments in the Indo-Pacific region are expected to continue unabated despite the war in Ukraine, as Beijing takes advantage of the conflict to expand its influence in the region, the agencies said in reports delivered to the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee on Sunday, ahead of a hearing yesterday on regional developments and trends. Although Russia’s invasion of
ONLINE REPORT: Confirmed cases filling out the online contact tracing report can check a box to indicate that a close contact had received a booster dose, an official said The guidelines for diagnosing COVID-19 have been revised to include people aged 65 or older who test positive with a rapid test that is confirmed by a healthcare worker, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said yesterday, as it reported 65,794 new local infections. The CECC had first announced the change on Monday, before publishing the new guidelines. Starting today, people aged 65 or older, regardless of whether they are undergoing home quarantine, home isolation or self-disease prevention, can be classified as a confirmed COVID-19 case by a healthcare professional, based on a positive result from an antigen rapid test, said
RSS