Cheng Hung-huei (鄭宏輝) has been dismissed from his role as an unpaid administrative consultant to the Cabinet, Premier Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) said on Wednesday, following sexual assault allegations against the former Hsinchu city councilor.
At a morning news conference, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Yu Shu-hui (游淑慧) accused Cheng of sexually assaulting a woman while giving her a ride home two years ago.
Cheng, a Democratic Progressive Party member who serves as chairman of Chunghwa Telecom (中華電信) subsidiary Senao International (神腦國際), denied the allegations, calling it a political attack.
Photo: Taipei Times files
Asked about the issue before an afternoon news conference, the premier said that Cheng had been dismissed in accordance with government regulations, as implication in a sexual harassment case would have contravened eligibility criteria at the time of employment.
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications has also been asked to set up a committee to investigate the allegations, Chen added.
Earlier in the day, Minister of Transportation and Communications Wang Kwo-tsai (王國材) said he had requested that Chunghwa Telecom suspend Cheng and launch an investigation.
If the committee finds wrongdoing, the telecom has been instructed to dismiss Cheng, he added.
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. The single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 400,000 and 800,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, saber-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. A single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 800,000 to 400,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, sabre-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Whether Japan would help defend Taiwan in case of a cross-strait conflict would depend on the US and the extent to which Japan would be allowed to act under the US-Japan Security Treaty, former Japanese minister of defense Satoshi Morimoto said. As China has not given up on the idea of invading Taiwan by force, to what extent Japan could support US military action would hinge on Washington’s intention and its negotiation with Tokyo, Morimoto said in an interview with the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) yesterday. There has to be sufficient mutual recognition of how Japan could provide
UPDATED TEST: The new rules aim to assess drivers’ awareness of risky behaviors and how they respond under certain circumstances, the Highway Bureau said Driver’s license applicants who fail to yield to pedestrians at intersections or to check blind spots, or omit pointing-and-calling procedures would fail the driving test, the Highway Bureau said yesterday. The change is set to be implemented at the end of the month, and is part of the bureau’s reform of the driving portion of the test, which has been criticized for failing to assess whether drivers can operate vehicles safely. Sedan drivers would be tested regarding yielding to pedestrians and turning their heads to check blind spots, while drivers of large vehicles would be tested on their familiarity with pointing-and-calling
RSS