Just one month after a row erupted over violation of press freedom, the Taipei District Court started trial proceedings against former top ranking official Lo Chih-hao (駱志豪) yesterday, probing allegations that sensitive information on international air negotiations leaked by Lo had seriously harmed national interests.
Lo, former secretary to Minister of Transportation and Communications, Tsay Jaw-yang (蔡兆陽), appeared in court on a charge of theft of public property, which was brought against him by Taipei district prosecutor, Lee Liang-chung (李良忠).
Lo, who was in charge of public relations between 1996 and 1999 -- at the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, and the Civil Aeronautics Administration -- is charged with leaking a total of 19 secret documents to three newspaper reporters and two editors from a weekly magazine.
The prosecution charged that Lo had breached regulations regarding the conduct of civil servants by stealing and photocopying confidential documents and leaking them to the media.
Lo denied stealing the documents and claimed it was his job as secretary to the minister to examine them. The charge of theft of public property, he contended, was a threat to civil servants all over the country.
The prosecution alleged Lo leaked information, saying he passed on to the press a duplicate transcript of the black box recordings from a China Airlines plane which crashed in Feb. 1998 killing a total of 202 people.
On the same charge it was alleged he leaked details of Taiwan's air negotiations with Thailand, Cambodia and Hong Kong; information that would prompt China to block progress of the talks and thus harm the island's interests.
Also, it was alleged, Lo had undermined the fairness of public bidding projects: privatization of the Number One Air Cargo Terminal and build-operate-transfer (BOT) bidding for the Number Two terminal, by leaking details of the project before a final decision was made by an evaluation committee.
Amid criticism that the freedom of the press had been undermined by the case against Lo, Lee argued that the prosecution made no attempt to restrict the media's access to government information.
But, he said, civil servants, whose conduct is clearly regulated by the law, have to restrain themselves from leaking any confidential information that would harm the national interest.
"In such a high ranking position, Lo had extensive access to a variety of confidential information. He should have been more prudent than any one else but he wasn't," Lee said.
"It's the nature of the media to pursue information, whatever secrets there may be. But it's the job of the civil servants to restrain themselves and protect national interest above anything."
The trial continues.
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