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.
MILITARY BOOST: The procurement was planned after Washington recommended that Taiwan increase its stock of air defense missiles, a defense official said yesterday Taiwan is planning to order an additional four PAC-3 MSE systems and up to 500 missiles in response to an increasing number of missile sites on China’s east coast, a defense official said yesterday. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that the proposed order would be placed using the defense procurement special budget, adding that about NT$1 trillion (US$32,88 billion) has been allocated for the budget. The proposed acquisition would include launchers, missiles, and a lower tier air and missile defense radar system, they said The procurement was planned after the US military recommended that Taiwan increase
POLITICAL AGENDA: Beijing’s cross-strait Mid-Autumn Festival events are part of a ‘cultural united front’ aimed at promoting unification with Taiwan, academics said Local authorities in China have been inviting Taiwanese to participate in cross-strait Mid-Autumn Festival celebrations centered around ideals of “family and nation,” a move Taiwanese academics said politicizes the holiday to promote the idea of “one family” across the Taiwan Strait. Sources said that China’s Fujian Provincial Government is organizing about 20 cross-strait-themed events in cities including Quanzhou, Nanping, Sanming and Zhangzhou. In Zhangzhou, a festival scheduled for Wednesday is to showcase Minnan-language songs and budaixi (布袋戲) glove puppetry to highlight cultural similarities between Taiwan and the region. Elsewhere, Jiangsu Province is hosting more than 10 similar celebrations in Taizhou, Changzhou, Suzhou,
TWO HEAVYWEIGHTS: Trump and Xi respect each other, are in a unique position to do something great, and they want to do that together, the US envoy to China said The administration of US President Donald Trump has told Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) “we don’t want any coercion, but we want [the Taiwan dispute] resolved peacefully,” US ambassador to China David Perdue said in a TV interview on Thursday. Trump “has said very clearly, we are not changing the ‘one China’ policy, we are going to adhere to the Taiwan Relations Act, the three communiques and the ‘six assurances’ that were done under [former US president Ronald] Reagan,” Perdue told Joe Kernen, cohost of CNBC’s Squawk Box. The act, the Three Joint Communiques and the “six assurances” are guidelines for Washington
DEEPENING TIES: The two are boosting cooperation in response to China’s coercive actions and have signed MOUs on search-and-rescue and anti-smuggling efforts Taiwan and Japan are moving to normalize joint coast guard training and considering the inclusion of other allies, the Japanese Yomiuri Shimbun reported yesterday. Both nations’ coast guards in June sent vessels to the seas south of the Sakishima Islands to conduct joint training, the report said, adding that it was the second joint maritime training exercise since the nations severed formal diplomatic ties in September 1972. Japan dispatched the Nagoya Coast Guard’s Mizuho, a 134m, 6,000-tonne patrol vessel which can carry a helicopter, while the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) sent the 126m, 4,000-tonne Yunlin, one of its largest vessels, the report
RSS