Proceeds totaling NT$1.02 billion (US$36.7 million) from recovered ill-gotten Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) assets and an administrative settlement are to be placed in a fund in the first quarter of next year, the Ill-gotten Party Assets Settlement Committee said.
The committee on Saturday said that it had so far recovered NT$75.89 million in unfairly or illegally acquired assets, as well as NT$950 million from a settlement with Central Motion Pictures Corp (CMPC, 中影公司).
The film studio on Aug. 24 agreed to hand over 330 films and NT$950 million, representing the amount CMPC was undervalued when it was in 2006 sold by Central Investment Co, a KMT affiliate.
Photo: Lee Hsin-fang, Taipei Times
The committee had initially frozen NT$11.8 billion of CMPC’s assets, which the studio appealed. The parties later reached a settlement agreeing to return the undervalued amount from the 2006 sale and transfer ownership of the films to the government in exchange for the committee repealing the company’s designation as a KMT affiliate, and unfreezing its remaining assets. The Taipei High Administrative Court recognized the settlement on Sept. 17.
The Transitional Justice Commission outlined possible uses for the fund: providing therapy for victims of political violence; establishing service centers to care for the survivors of political persecution; a reward system for those who preserve historical sites related to the White Terror period; and a database for records related to political persecution, it said.
After the commission concludes in May, other government agencies that handle transitional justice work could apply to use the fund, it said.
Commission member Frank Wang (王增勇) said that the commission had been unable to establish a fund with the recovered assets, as previously it had only recovered about NT$10 million.
The commission was concerned that if a fund is not established before it concludes, it might not be possible to do so later, Wang said.
The commission must wait until cases related to the recovered assets complete judicial procedures before the money can be used, committee spokesman Sun Pin (孫斌) said.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫), spokeswoman Yang Chih-yu (楊智伃) and Legislator Hsieh Lung-chieh (謝龍介) would be summoned by police for questioning for leading an illegal assembly on Thursday evening last week, Minister of the Interior Liu Shyh-fang (劉世芳) said today. The three KMT officials led an assembly outside the Taipei City Prosecutors’ Office, a restricted area where public assembly is not allowed, protesting the questioning of several KMT staff and searches of KMT headquarters and offices in a recall petition forgery case. Chu, Yang and Hsieh are all suspected of contravening the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法) by holding
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