In the wake of last week’s Paris attacks, lawmakers across party lines yesterday questioned national security officials in the legislature’s Foreign and National Defense Committee, saying the government’s system to react to possible terror attacks is disorganized.
Office of Homeland Security Deputy Director Huang Chun-tai (黃俊泰) said the nation’s counter-terrorism mechanism is, if needed, initiated by the National Security Bureau, which is responsible for gauging a situation and examining intelligence, while the office is responsible for assisting with response measures.
“There are nine response taskforces that would be formed according to counterterrorism guidelines, with each to be led by ministry heads, contingent upon the characteristics of an attack, which might be related to radiation, chemicals or other things,” Huang said, adding that the office is a “support unit,” responsible for coordination between different agencies.
“The first-level response center would be established, headed by the premier as commander-in-chief, should an attack comparable to Paris happen,” Huang said.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators Johnny Chiang (江啟臣) and Chen Chen-hsiang (陳鎮湘) panned the bureaucratic overlap of the proposed system, saying that the Executive Yuan-run office is a mission-oriented unit of the central government aimed at coordination, which could make the delivery of orders chaotic.
“You do not even have a direct communication link between the office and the Ministry of National Defense,” Chen said, referring to a diagram of the system he displayed at the meeting.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Huang Wei-che (黃偉哲) called the security agency “simply a liaison office.”
The lawmakers proposed an extraordinary motion demanding that the office — “which is only an administrative, supporting
organization that does not have functions such as information gathering and assessment” — sort out the responsibilities and draw up counter-terrorism-related regulations governing the command system, training and its budget.
Asked about pre-emptive measures being taken, National Security Bureau Deputy Secretary-General Wang Der-lin (王德麟) simply said that according to the latest information, no Taiwanese have joined the Islamic State group.
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