According to a CNA report, France's former foreign minister, Roland Dumas, revealed yesterday in an exclusive interview with Le Figaro, a daily newspaper, that a commission of US$500 million was paid by France in 1991 when six Lafayette-class frigates were sold to Taiwan.
The sum was approved by former president Francois Mitterand, and others including the premier and the finance and budget ministers all knew of the deal.
Of the total, US$400 million was paid to the secretary-general of Taiwan's then ruling party, the KMT, while US$100 million went to the Chinese Communist Party's Central Committee in Beijing.
Though Dumas did not name the secretary-general concerned, James Soong (宋楚瑜), now PFP chairman, served as KMT secretary-general from 1989 to 1993.
On Jan. 24, Dumas won a verdict of not guilty in Paris' appeals court, overturning a previous conviction for embezzling from the public treasury that stemmed from the Lafayette case.
On May 31 last year he was sentenced to six months in prison. The publication of yesterday's interview was timed to coincide with the release of Dumas' new book Evidence, Evidence.
In his 430-page book, Dumas does not bring forward any new evidence, but he does give a more detailed explanation of the US$500 million commission that was revealed by Le Figaro in March 2001.
Dumas says that Thomson CSF, the company that sold the frigates, provided the French government with all documents regarding the distribution of commission payments in the summer of 1992, and that the amount totalled US$500 million.
Dumas said that during a dinner on March 18, 1997, he received information from the then Budget Minister Michel Charasse.
Charasse said that, according to customs documents, US$400 million of the commission payments went to the secretary-general of Taiwan's ruling party, and US$100 million went to the central leadership of the Chinese Communist Party.
At that time, he was also told another piece of classified information, namely that "the president approved that I should request that Thomson pay this commission to the Chinese and Taiwanese authorities."
In response to Duma's allegation, PFP spokesman Hsieh Kong-ping (謝公秉) said yesterday that the party's chairman Soong denied any role in the Lafayette deal.
Hsieh said that during the 2000 presidential campaign, Soong was the first presidential candidate to call for further investigation of the scandal in order to dig out the truth.
Hsieh added that, since Dumas might not understand Taiwan's political system, whether what Dumas referred to was the ruling party or the government needed to be clarified.
South Korea has adjusted its electronic arrival card system to no longer list Taiwan as a part of China, a move that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said would help facilitate exchanges between the two sides. South Korea previously listed “Taiwan” as “Taiwan (China)” in the drop-down menus of its online arrival card system, where people had to fill out where they came from and their next destination. The ministry had requested South Korea make a revision and said it would change South Korea’s name on Taiwan’s online immigration system from “Republic of Korea” to “Korea (South),” should the issue not be
Tainan, Taipei and New Taipei City recorded the highest fines nationwide for illegal accommodations in the first quarter of this year, with fines issued in the three cities each exceeding NT$7 million (US$220,639), Tourism Administration data showed. Among them, Taipei had the highest number of illegal short-term rental units, with 410. There were 3,280 legally registered hotels nationwide in the first quarter, down by 14 properties, or 0.43 percent, from a year earlier, likely indicating operators exiting the market, the agency said. However, the number of unregistered properties rose to 1,174, including 314 illegal hotels and 860 illegal short-term rental
Both sides of the Taiwan Strait share a political foundation based on the “1992 consensus” and opposition to Taiwanese independence, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) today said during her meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平). Both sides of the Strait should plan and build institutionalized and sustainable mechanisms for dialogue and cooperation based on that foundation to make peaceful development across the Strait irreversible, she said. Peace is a shared moral value across the Strait, and both sides should move beyond political confrontation to seek institutionalized solutions to prevent war, she said. Mutually beneficial cross-strait relations are what the
ECONOMIC COERCION: Such actions are often inconsistently applied, sometimes resumed, and sometimes just halted, the Presidential Office spokeswoman said The government backs healthy and orderly cross-strait exchanges, but such arrangements should not be made with political conditions attached and never be used as leverage for political maneuvering or partisan agendas, Presidential Office spokeswoman Karen Kuo (郭雅慧) said yesterday. Kuo made the remarks after China earlier in the day announced 10 new “incentive measures” for Taiwan, following a landmark meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) in Beijing on Friday. The measures, unveiled by China’s Xinhua news agency, include plans to resume individual travel by residents of Shanghai and China’s Fujian
RSS