Hsiao Teng-piao (蕭登標), a former Chiayi County Council speaker who has been on the run from police since 1996, said during an interview with a cable TV station yesterday that he would report to the Chiayi District Prosecutors' Office himself within days, the Chinese-language media said yesterday.
Hsiao said in the interview with TVBS that Minister of Justice Yeh Chin-fong (
Hsiao, who has been on the run since police targeted him during a large-scale anti-gangster crusade in 1996, faces five charges should he be arrested. The charges range from blackmail and fraud to gambling.
Hsiao said he was "framed" by former Minister of Justice Liao Cheng-hao (
Hsiao also said the main reason why he failed to show up as he had promised in the Legislative Yuan about a week ago is the presence of a large number of heavily-armed police awaiting his arrival. He had notified the media that he was to hold a press conference there.
Hsiao asked Minister of the Interior Huang Chu-wen (
He took full responsibility for evading police, claiming that no one helped him flee arrest during the past three years. He also said he has been in Taiwan the entire time and that reports to the contrary were just rumors.
The interview, however, has embarrassed the Ministry of Justice, which failed to find Hsiao before the media. The ministry said the Chiayi District Prosecutors' Office would find Hsiao's whereabouts through the TV station.
WAITING GAME: The US has so far only offered a ‘best rate tariff,’ which officials assume is about 15 percent, the same as Japan, a person familiar with the matter said Taiwan and the US have completed “technical consultations” regarding tariffs and a finalized rate is expected to be released soon, Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a news conference yesterday, as a 90-day pause on US President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs is set to expire today. The two countries have reached a “certain degree of consensus” on issues such as tariffs, nontariff trade barriers, trade facilitation, supply chain resilience and economic security, Lee said. They also discussed opportunities for cooperation, investment and procurement, she said. A joint statement is still being negotiated and would be released once the US government has made
NEW GEAR: On top of the new Tien Kung IV air defense missiles, the military is expected to place orders for a new combat vehicle next year for delivery in 2028 Mass production of Tien Kung IV (Sky Bow IV) missiles is expected to start next year, with plans to order 122 pods, the Ministry of National Defense’s (MND) latest list of regulated military material showed. The document said that the armed forces would obtain 46 pods of the air defense missiles next year and 76 pods the year after that. The Tien Kung IV is designed to intercept cruise missiles and ballistic missiles to an altitude of 70km, compared with the 60km maximum altitude achieved by the Missile Segment Enhancement variant of PAC-3 systems. A defense source said yesterday that the number of
‘CRUDE’: The potential countermeasure is in response to South Africa renaming Taiwan’s representative offices and the insistence that it move out of Pretoria Taiwan is considering banning exports of semiconductors to South Africa after the latter unilaterally downgraded and changed the names of Taiwan’s two representative offices, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. On Monday last week, the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation unilaterally released a statement saying that, as of April 1, the Taipei Liaison Offices in Pretoria and Cape Town had been renamed the “Taipei Commercial Office in Johannesburg” and the “Taipei Commercial Office in Cape Town.” Citing UN General Assembly Resolution 2758, it said that South Africa “recognizes the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the sole
Taiwanese exports to the US are to be subject to a 20 percent tariff starting on Thursday next week, according to an executive order signed by US President Donald Trump yesterday. The 20 percent levy was the same as the tariffs imposed on Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh by Trump. It was higher than the tariffs imposed on Japan, South Korea and the EU (15 percent), as well as those on the Philippines (19 percent). A Taiwan official with knowledge of the matter said it is a "phased" tariff rate, and negotiations would continue. "Once negotiations conclude, Taiwan will obtain a better
RSS