The Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday indicted a man for allegedly attempting to create a Taiwanese branch of Hikvision Digital Technology Co, a Chinese drone and surveillance camera company with ties to Beijing.
The man, surnamed Lou (樓), a former sales manager for Taiwan at Hikivision, faces charges related to breaches of the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the prosecutors’ office said.
Another man, surnamed Chen (陳), who is registered as the head of Koangyow Integration Machine Co and allegedly allowed Lou to use his company as a shell corporation for Hikivision, was granted deferred prosecution, it said.
Photo: Wang Ting-chuan, Taipei Times
Lou asked local distributors to delegate their recruiting rights to Hikvision and discussed salaries directly with people applying for sales positions, prosecutors said.
Hikivision is the world’s largest manufacturer of surveillance equipment. It is a Chinese People’s Liberation Army research and development partner and its main supplier of drones.
In 2020, the US Department of Defense blacklisted Hikvision products, citing the corporation’s close ties with China’s armed forces, an allegation the company denies.
That year, Lou was hired by Hikivision as its Taiwan sales manager, and in 2021 he was tasked with hiring tech workers and investing in Taiwan without authorization from the Ministry of Economic Affairs’ Investment Review Committee, contravening Article 40-1 of the act, prosecutors said.
The article says that an enterprise from China or an enterprise in which it has invested in a third area cannot “engage in any business activities in Taiwan,” unless it is “permitted by the competent authorities and has established in the Taiwan Area a branch or liaison office.”
The penalty is up to three years in prison and/or a fine of up to NT$15 million (US$485,972).
Additional reporting by CNA
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
NAMING SPAT: The foreign ministry called on Denmark to propose an acceptable solution to the erroneous nationality used for Taiwanese on residence permits Taiwan has revoked some privileges for Danish diplomatic staff over a Danish permit that lists “Taiwan” as “China,” Eric Huang (黃鈞耀), head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Department of European Affairs, told a news conference in Taipei yesterday. Reporters asked Huang whether the Danish government had responded to the ministry’s request that it correct the nationality on Danish residence permits of Taiwanese, which has been listed as “China” since 2024. Taiwan’s representative office in Denmark continues to communicate with the Danish government, and the ministry has revoked some privileges previously granted to Danish representatives in Taiwan and would continue to review
The first bluefin tuna of the season, brought to shore in Pingtung County and weighing 190kg, was yesterday auctioned for NT$10,600 (US$333.5) per kilogram, setting a record high for the local market. The auction was held at the fish market in Donggang Fishing Harbor, where the Siaoliouciou Island-registered fishing vessel Fu Yu Ching No. 2 delivered the “Pingtung First Tuna” it had caught for bidding. Bidding was intense, and the tuna was ultimately jointly purchased by a local restaurant and a local company for NT$10,600 per kilogram — NT$300 ,more than last year — for a total of NT$2.014 million. The 67-year-old skipper
RSS