Two Taiwanese were given three years deferred prosecution for their roles in helping two leading Chinese tech companies operate illegally in the country, the Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office said.
The two men, surnamed Doong (董) and Chang (張), had admitted wrongdoing and were handed deferred prosecution as part of their settlements reached with prosecutors, a court document issued on Tuesday showed.
As part of the agreements, Doong and Chang were handed penalties of NT$500,000 (US$16,124) and NT$300,000, while the two companies Doong had established in Taiwan — CXMOS and Tenafe Taiwan Technology Ltd — were ordered to make payments of NT$500,000 and NT$300,000 into the national coffers.
Photo: Taipei Times
Doong worked as an assistant manager at Wuhan-based Yangtze Memory Technologies Co (YMTC, 長江存儲) — a Chinese semiconductor integrated device manufacturer specializing in flash memory chips — from 2016 to 2019, the prosecutors said.
In November 2017, under that company’s instruction, Doong set up CXMOS in Taiwan, imported chip samples from YMTC and interviewed people in Taiwan for sales positions, in a bid to explore business opportunities in the nation, prosecutors said.
Doong was also accused of establishing and running Tenafe Taiwan Technology Ltd in May 2019, a subsidiary of Tenafe Beijing, which shipped semiconductor components, printed circuit boards and chips from its headquarters to be used as samples and for testing, as a way to boost the Beijing company’s sales in Taiwan.
Chang took over Doong’s position at Tenafe Taiwan in June 2021 and interviewed more than 30 engineers, prosecutors said.
It was found that about NT$500 million from YMTC and Tenafe Beijing had been indirectly channeled into CXMOS and Tenafe Taiwan’s bank accounts to boost funds available to them, the prosecutors said.
They said they believed Doong and Chang’s actions had breached Article 40-1 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 clause says that an enterprise from China or an enterprise it 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 cited for violating Article 40-1 is up to three years in prison and/or a fine of up to NT$15 million.
Taiwan yesterday condemned the recent increase in Chinese coast guard-escorted fishing vessels operating illegally in waters around the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. Unusually large groupings of Chinese fishing vessels began to appear around the islands on Feb. 15, when at least six motherships and 29 smaller boats were sighted, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said in a news release. While CGA vessels were dispatched to expel the Chinese boats, Chinese coast guard ships trespassed into Taiwan’s restricted waters and unsuccessfully attempted to interfere, the CGA said. Due to the provocation, the CGA initiated an operation to increase
A crowd of over 200 people gathered outside the Taipei District Court as two sisters indicted for abusing a 1-year-old boy to death attended a preliminary hearing in the case yesterday afternoon. The crowd held up signs and chanted slogans calling for aggravated penalties in child abuse cases and asking for no bail and “capital punishment.” They also held white flowers in memory of the boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), who was allegedly tortured to death by the sisters in December 2023. The boy died four months after being placed in full-time foster care with the
The Shanlan Express (山嵐號), or “Mountain Mist Express,” is scheduled to launch on April 19 as part of the centennial celebration of the inauguration of the Taitung Line. The tourism express train was renovated from the Taiwan Railway Corp’s EMU500 commuter trains. It has four carriages and a seating capacity of 60 passengers. Lion Travel is arranging railway tours for the express service. Several news outlets were invited to experience the pilot tour on the new express train service, which is to operate between Hualien Railway Station and Chihshang (池上) Railway Station in Taitung County. It would also be the first tourism service
‘MALIGN PURPOSE’: Governments around the world conduct espionage operations, but China’s is different, as its ultimate goal is annexation, a think tank head said Taiwan is facing a growing existential threat from its own people spying for China, experts said, as the government seeks to toughen measures to stop Beijing’s infiltration efforts and deter Taiwanese turncoats. While Beijing and Taipei have been spying on each other for years, experts said that espionage posed a bigger threat to Taiwan due to the risk of a Chinese attack. Taiwan’s intelligence agency said China used “diverse channels and tactics” to infiltrate the nation’s military, government agencies and pro-China organizations. The main targets were retired and active members of the military, persuaded by money, blackmail or pro-China ideology to steal
RSS