Prosecutors probing New Party members over alleged espionage activities for China are now focusing on the possible leaking of classified information about the nation’s top military special operations unit, according to a report in the Chinese-language United Daily News.
The Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office is looking into allegations that New Party Youth Corps member Lin Ming-cheng (林明正) passed on personal information and contact details of soldiers in the Army Aviation and Special Forces Command’s secretive Airborne Special Service Company (高空特種勤務中隊), also known as the “Liang Shan Special Operations Company” (涼山特勤隊) to former Chinese student Zhou Hongxu (周泓旭), who has been convicted of doing intelligence work for China, the newspaper said yesterday.
The Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau’s national security branch summoned a Liang Shan company officer for questioning, the report said, adding that he had admitted to being a friend of Lin.
The officer said he had provided names and contact information of fellow company members at dinner gatherings, the report said.
The officer added Lin as a friend on Facebook and thought it was just normal social interaction to talk about fellow service members, the newspaper said, adding that he regretted it after learning that Lin was accused of collecting classified materials on Taiwan’s armed forces for Zhou.
Prosecutors were quoted by media as saying they believed Zhou was not only trying to obtain names and contact details, but was trying to obtain top secret information on the Liang Shan company’s deployment and special missions.
Investigators debriefed the officer to find out the extent of the leaks, but said he insisted that he had only provided names and details, and had not passed any classified military information to Lin.
Known as Taiwan’s most secretive military unit — equivalent to the US Navy’s elite Sea, Air and Land teams, also known as Navy SEALs — the Liang Shan company is reportedly capable of covert commando strike operations and is based at Pingtung County’s Liangshan (涼山).
If information about the unit were to leak out, it would constitute a serious national security breach, as the unit is responsible for counterterrorism and other special combat missions over and above the regular armed forces.
Prosecutors have said that Zhou targeted the Liang Shan company, as the unit is reportedly trained as Taiwan’s stealth “decapitation” commandos tasked with striking enemy leaders in times of war, but this has never been clarified by top military brass.
According to investigators, Lin served as secretary-general of the “Association of New Chinese Sons and Daughters” (新中華兒女協會) in 2014 when he became acquainted with Zhou and they had frequent interactions about their aligned political views.
Later, Zhou began to request information about Lin’s friends and members of his social circle who were serving in Taiwan’s armed forces, investigators said.
Lin allegedly passed information on five military officers to Zhou, the highest ranked of whom was a colonel, but also including military cadets, which Zhou contacted in hopes of recruiting them to form a spy network, investigators said.
Lin, New Party spokesman Wang Ping-chung (王炳忠) and fellow party Youth Corps members Hou Han-ting (侯漢廷) and Chen Ssu-chun (陳斯俊) were on Dec. 19 summoned for questioning in connection with Zhou’s conviction for espionage in violation of the National Security Act (國家安全法).
Prosecutors reportedly uncovered e-mail correspondence between Zhou and the four from confiscated computers and mobile phones, which they said showed that Zhou had promised to fund pro-China organizations and networks, including paying NT$5 million (US$169,359) to the “Association of New Chinese Sons and Daughters.”
Taiwanese scientists have engineered plants that can capture about 50 percent more carbon dioxide and produce more than twice as many seeds as unmodified plants, a breakthrough they hope could one day help mitigate global warming and grow more food staples such as rice. If applied to major food crops, the new system could cut carbon emissions and raise yields “without additional equipment or labor costs,” Academia Sinica researcher and lead author the study Lu Kuan-jen (呂冠箴) said. Academia Sinica president James Liao (廖俊智) said that as humans emit 9.6 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide compared with the 220 billion tonnes absorbed
The Taipei Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) Wanda-Zhonghe Line is 81.7 percent complete, with public opening targeted for the end of 2027, New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) said today. Surrounding roads are to be open to the public by the end of next year, Hou said during an inspection of construction progress. The 9.5km line, featuring nine underground stations and one depot, is expected to connect Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall Station to Chukuang Station in New Taipei City’s Jhonghe District (中和). All 18 tunnels for the line are complete, while the main structures of the stations and depot are mostly finished, he
Taipei is to implement widespread road closures around Taipei 101 on Friday to make way for large crowds during the Double Ten National Day celebration, the Taipei Department of Transportation said. A four-minute fireworks display is to be launched from the skyscraper, along with a performance by 500 drones flying in formation above the nearby Nanshan A21 site, starting at 10pm. Vehicle restrictions would occur in phases, they said. From 5pm to 9pm, inner lanes of Songshou Road between Taipei City Hall and Taipei 101 are to be closed, with only the outer lanes remaining open. Between 9pm and 9:40pm, the section is
China’s plan to deploy a new hypersonic ballistic missile at a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) base near Taiwan likely targets US airbases and ships in the western Pacific, but it would also present new threats to Taiwan, defense experts said. The New York Times — citing a US Department of Defense report from last year on China’s military power — on Monday reported in an article titled “The missiles threatening Taiwan” that China has stockpiled 3,500 missiles, 1.5 times more than four years earlier. Although it is unclear how many of those missiles were targeting Taiwan, the newspaper reported
RSS