Two controversial illegal waste dumping cases in southern and central Taiwan ended temporarily yesterday when prosecutors indicted waste handlers, officials and industrial firms involved, proposing millions of dollars in fines and lengthy prison terms.
In Kaohsiung County, four officials involved in the operation of a waste incinerator in Meinung township (
The accused include former and current Meinung township wardens Chung Hsin-tsai (鍾新財) and Chung Shao-huei (鍾紹恢), as well as two former and current environmental officials, Lin Cheng-ming (林振明) and Huang Ming-ying (黃銘英).
Prosecutors asked that Chung Hsin-tsai and Lin be sentenced to six-and-a-half years in prison and Chung Shao-huei and Huang be sentenced to five years each. It is believed that the accused earned at least NT$194 million by helping Sunny Friend Environmental Technology Co Ltd (日友公司), which runs the household waste incinerator.
According to prosecutors, who have spent nine months investigating the case, in 1997 the officials proposed building an incinerator in a buffer zone beside a river, where construction is prohibited.
Later, the officials forged documents to help Sunny Friend receive financial assistance for waste management from both the Cabinet's Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) and local government.
Prosecutors said the officials also forged documents to help the company to obtain an operating license from the local government.
The prosecutors also allege the company secretly burned industrial waste in the incinerator and dumped toxic fly ash and bottom ash collected from the incinerator in a nearby river, which leads to the Kaoping River (
Hsinchu firms targeted
In related news, in Taichung, 19 people involved in an illegal toxic solvent discharge case were also indicted yesterday, including United Microelectronics Corp (聯電) Chairman John Hsuan (宣明智) and Vanguard International (世界先進) Chairman Morris Chang (張忠謀).
Officials for UMC and Vanguard yesterday declined to comment on the indictments, saying that they had not yet received copies of the court documents.
In October, at a site in Wuji township in Taichung County, prosecutors -- accompanied by environmental protection officials -- caught workers hired by Ho Hsing Barrel Co (
EPA officials said that toxic solvents -- including potassium hydroxide, silica and hydrofluoric acid -- might have seriously polluted the soil where it was dumped and may have contaminated the nearby Tatu River (大肚溪).
Prosecutors allege that the sources of the toxic waste solvents were several high-tech industrial firms, including UMC, Vanguard and Daiion (太洋新技), one of the Taiwan branches of Japanese firm Mitsubishi Chemicals. Two Japanese officials with Daiion were also indicted yesterday.
Under the Waste Disposal Act and the Toxic Chemical Substances Control Act, prosecutors indicted Tsai Fa-tzu (
Li Ching-yi (李慶義), spokesman for the Taiwan High Court's Prosecutors' Office Taichung Branch, said the toxic solvent corrosive hydrofluoric acid was produced by Hsinchu-based Daiion.
Daiion sold the solvent to Vanguard and promised to recycle used barrels. Daiion, however, did not do so. Instead, prosecutors contend Daiion sold used barrels to two barrels companies, which later sold the barrels to Ho Hsing.
Spokesman Li said that Daiion also sold solvent to UMC but did not promise to recycle used barrels. UMC authorized a waste handler, Yunglung Environmental Protection Inc (
The EPA has searched for sites that could serve as final disposal sites for industrial waste in order to meet the demands of industrial companies who claim to have suffered from a lack of legal waste handlers on the island.
Several illegal waste dumping cases have been uncovered in recent years, especially in southern Taiwan.
The most notorious case occurred last July in Kaohsiung County when illegal dumping of toxic waste into the Kaoping River (高屏溪), left 3 million residents in and around Kaohsiung without drinking water for five days.
The Ministry of the Interior (MOI) is to tighten rules for candidates running for public office, requiring them to declare that they do not hold a Chinese household registration or passport, and that they possess no other foreign citizenship. The requirement was set out in a draft amendment to the Enforcement Rules of the Public Officials Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法 ) released by the ministry on Thursday. Under the proposal, candidates would need to make the declaration when submitting their registration forms, which would be published in the official election bulletin. The move follows the removal of several elected officials who were
FOUR DESIGNATED AREAS: Notices were issued for live-fire exercises in waters south and northwest of Penghu, northeast of Keelung and west of Kaohsiung, they said The military is planning three major annual exercises across the army, navy and air force this month, with the navy’s “Hai Chiang” (海強, “Sea Strong”) drills running from today through Friday, the Ministry of National Defense said yesterday. The Hai Chiang exercise, which is to take place in waters surrounding Taiwan, would feature P-3C Orion maritime patrol aircraft and S-70C anti-submarine helicopters, the ministry said, adding that the drills aim to bolster the nation’s offshore defensive capabilities. China has intensified military and psychological pressure against Taiwan, repeatedly sending warplanes and vessels into areas near the nation’s air defense identification zone and across
FORCED LABOR: A US court listed three Taiwanese and nine firms based in Taiwan in its indictment, with eight of the companies registered at the same address Nine companies registered in Taiwan, as well as three Taiwanese, on Tuesday were named by the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) as Specially Designated Nationals (SDNs) as a result of a US federal court indictment. The indictment unsealed at the federal court in Brooklyn, New York, said that Chen Zhi (陳志), a dual Cambodian-British national, is being indicted for fraud conspiracy, money laundering and overseeing Prince Holding Group’s forced-labor scam camps in Cambodia. At its peak, the company allegedly made US$30 million per day, court documents showed. The US government has seized Chen’s noncustodial wallet, which contains
SENATE RECOMMENDATION: The National Defense Authorization Act encourages the US secretary of defense to invite Taiwan’s navy to participate in the exercises in Hawaii The US Senate on Thursday last week passed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for Fiscal Year 2026, which strongly encourages the US secretary of defense to invite Taiwan’s naval forces to participate in the Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) exercise, as well as allocating military aid of US$1 billion for Taiwan. The bill, which authorizes appropriations for the military activities of the US Department of Defense, military construction and other purposes, passed with 77 votes in support and 20 against. While the NDAA authorizes about US$925 billion of defense spending, the Central News Agency yesterday reported that an aide of US
RSS