Several lawmakers yesterday expressed concerns about Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Wu Sz-huai (吳斯懷) requesting information from the Ministry of National Defense for information — which reportedly included highly classified materials on military units.
Wu, a retired lieutenant general, previously sparked controversy when he reportedly attended an event in China commemorating the 150th birthday of Sun Yat-sen (孫逸仙) in 2016, when he sat through a speech by Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and stood for a rendition of the Chinese national anthem.
The ministry on Thursday confirmed that Wu had requested information, with local media quoting a ranking officer as saying that the requests included materials on cyberdefense units at the new Information and Electronic Warfare Command and troop deployments for all three major branches of the armed forces, as well as updates on combined service units and military operations plans.
Photo: Liao Chen-huei, Taipei Times
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Wang Ting-yu (王定宇), who serves on the Legislative Yuan’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, said that while Wu is a retired officer, he sits on the legislature’s Social Welfare and Environmental Hygiene Committee, so he should focus on the tasks and issues concerning that panel.
“In addition to requesting information on cyberdefense units, Wu also inquired about the indigenous submarine development program. His actions are worrying and his motives are certainly questionable,” Wang said on Facebook yesterday.
The pro-independence Taiwan Statebuilding Party issued a statement condemning Wu.
“With the global Wuhan virus outbreak, China has stepped up its misinformation campaign, but Wu has not said a word. Now he wants to access classified information on Taiwan’s cyberwarfare units. We have to ask, is Wu collaborating with China from inside the legislature?” the party said.
While Wu’s requests are within the authority of a legislator, the doubts of the Taiwanese public must first be cleared up, Taiwan Statebuilding Party Legislator Chen Po-wei (陳柏惟) said, asking Wu: “Which side are you on? For whom do you fight?”
“Taiwanese know who we are fighting … that the enemy is China,” he added.
However, several KMT members defended Wu, saying that requesting information from government agencies is within the scope and authority of legislators.
As veteran, it is reasonable for him to request white papers and other reports from the ministry, Wu said, adding that contrary to media reports, he only requested public information, not “classified military materials.”
In a short statement, the ministry said that it had provided Wu with publicly available information, adding that lawmakers are authorized to make such requests in accordance with the legislature’s oversight role.
Additional reporting by CNA
A global survey showed that 60 percent of Taiwanese had attained higher education, second only to Canada, the Ministry of the Interior said. Taiwan easily surpassed the global average of 43 percent and ranked ahead of major economies, including Japan, South Korea and the US, data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) for 2024 showed. Taiwan has a high literacy rate, data released by the ministry showed. As of the end of last year, Taiwan had 20.617 million people aged 15 or older, accounting for 88.5 percent of the total population, with a literacy rate of 99.4 percent, the data
NEW LOW: The council in 2024 based predictions on a pessimistic estimate for the nation’s total fertility rate of 0.84, but last year that rate was 0.69, 17 percent lower An expected National Development Council (NDC) report expects the nation’s population to drop below 12 million by 2065, with the old-age dependency ratio to top 100 percent sooner than 2070, sources said yesterday. The council is slated to release its latest population projections in August, using an ultra-low fertility model, the sources said. The previous report projected that Taiwan’s population would fall to 14.37 million by 2070, but based on a new estimate of the total fertility rate (TFR) — the average number of children born to a woman over her lifetime — the population is expected to reach 12 million by
INTENSIFYING THREATS: Beijing’s tactics include massive attacks on the government service network, aircraft and naval vessel incursions and damaging undersea cables China is prepared to interfere in November’s nine-in-one local elections by launching massive attacks on the Taiwanese government’s service network (GSN), a report published by the National Security Bureau showed. The report was submitted to the Legislative Yuan ahead of the bureau’s scheduled briefing at the Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee tomorrow. The national security team has identified about 13,000 suspicious Internet accounts and 860,000 disputed messages, the bureau said of China’s cognitive warfare against Taiwan. The disputed messages focus on major foreign affairs, national defense and economic issues, which were produced using generative artificial intelligence (AI) and distributed through Chinese
COUNTERING HOSTILITY: The draft bill would require the US to increase diplomatic pressure on China and would impose sanctions on those who sabotage undersea cable networks US lawmakers on Thursday introduced a bipartisan bill to bolster the resilience of Taiwan’s submarine cables to counter China’s hostile activities. The proposal, titled the critical undersea infrastructure resilience initiative act, was cosponsored by Republican representatives Mike Lawler and Greg Stanton, and Democratic Representative Dave Min. US Senators John Curtis and Jacky Rosen also introduced a companion bill in the US Senate, which has passed markup at the chamber’s Committee on Foreign Relations. The House’s version of the bill would prioritize the deployment of sensors to detect disruptions or potential sabotage in real-time and enhance early warning capabilities through global intelligence sharing frameworks,
RSS