A retired lieutenant general has been charged after using funds from China to recruit military personnel for an “armed” group that would assist invading Chinese forces, prosecutors said yesterday.
The retired officer, Kao An-kuo (高安國), was among six people indicted for contravening the National Security Act (國家安全法), the High Prosecutors’ Office said in a statement.
The group visited China multiple times, separately and together, from 2018 to last year, where they met Chinese military intelligence personnel for instructions and funding “to initiate and develop organizations for China,” prosecutors said.
Photo: screen grab from Kao An-kuo’s Facebook page
Their actions posed a “serious threat” to “national security and social stability,” the statement said.
After retiring from the army, Kao and another defendant used Chinese funds to form “an armed organization” — the “Republic of China Taiwan Military Government” — that would act as an “internal collaborator” if China attacked Taiwan, it said.
They also engaged in “scouting, contacting, wooing and absorbing retired and active service members,” putting national security in a “dangerous state,” it added.
Prosecutors have sought a minimum jail term of 10 years for Kao, saying that he failed his “high duty of loyalty to the country as a retired lieutenant general deputy commander for the sake of personal gain.”
The other defendants face up to eight years in jail, prosecutors said.
The statement did not say how much money Kao or the others received, but it has previously reported that the six defendants collectively received more than NT$9.62 million (US$293,525) in funding from China.
There has been a series of spying cases in Taiwan, as China maintains military and political pressure on Taipei.
The National Security Bureau said in a recent report that the number of people prosecuted for spying for Beijing has “increased significantly,” from 10 in 2022 to 64 last year.
CHIPMAKING INVESTMENT: J.W. Kuo told legislators that Department of Investment Review approval would be needed were Washington to seek a TSMC board seat Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) yesterday said he received information about a possible US government investment in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and an assessment of the possible effect on the firm requires further discussion. If the US were to invest in TSMC, the plan would need to be reviewed by the Department of Investment Review, Kuo told reporters ahead of a hearing of the legislature’s Economics Committee. Kuo’s remarks came after US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on Tuesday said that the US government is looking into the federal government taking equity stakes in computer chip manufacturers that
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers have declared they survived recall votes to remove them from office today, although official results are still pending as the vote counting continues. Although final tallies from the Central Election Commission (CEC) are still pending, preliminary results indicate that the recall campaigns against all seven KMT lawmakers have fallen short. As of 6:10 pm, Taichung Legislators Yen Kuan-heng (顏寬恒) and Yang Chiung-ying (楊瓊瓔), Hsinchu County Legislator Lin Szu-ming (林思銘), Nantou County Legislator Ma Wen-chun (馬文君) and New Taipei City Legislator Lo Ming-tsai (羅明才) had all announced they
POWER PLANT POLL: The TPP said the number of ‘yes’ votes showed that the energy policy should be corrected, and the KMT said the result was a win for the people’s voice The government does not rule out advanced nuclear energy generation if it meets the government’s three prerequisites, President William Lai (賴清德) said last night after the number of votes in favor of restarting a nuclear power plant outnumbered the “no” votes in a referendum yesterday. The referendum failed to pass, despite getting more “yes” votes, as the Referendum Act (公民投票法) states that the vote would only pass if the votes in favor account for more than one-fourth of the total number of eligible voters and outnumber the opposing votes. Yesterday’s referendum question was: “Do you agree that the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) yesterday visited Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), as the chipmaker prepares for volume production of Nvidia’s next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) chips. It was Huang’s third trip to Taiwan this year, indicating that Nvidia’s supply chain is deeply connected to Taiwan. Its partners also include packager Siliconware Precision Industries Co (矽品精密) and server makers Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) and Quanta Computer Inc (廣達). “My main purpose is to visit TSMC,” Huang said yesterday. “As you know, we have next-generation architecture called Rubin. Rubin is very advanced. We have now taped out six brand new
RSS