Ten people have been indicted and are being detained for allegedly smuggling cannabis into Taiwan from a tanker vessel, the Ciaotou District Prosecutors’ Office said yesterday.
The suspects allegedly smuggled cannabis off southwestern Taiwan in December last year and have been detained with the approval of a local court, the office said in a statement.
The prosecutors said they had been investigating and monitoring suspicious activities for three months before directing the Coast Guard Administration to board a Tainan-registered commercial raft in waters off the northwestern coast of Kaohsiung on Dec. 10.
Photo: Wu Cheng-feng, Taipei Times
Coast guards seized four packages of cannabis weighing 221.7kg, the statement said.
The next day, unoccupied lifeboats with tow ropes were found floating in the same waters carrying 20 similar bags of cannabis weighing 1,159.3kg, it said.
Prosecutors determined that a foreign oil tanker in waters to the southwest was at the center of the drug trafficking activities, and dispatched the coast guard to intercept, board and inspect the vessel, it said.
Three Taiwanese and seven Burmese crew members were taken into custody on suspicion of drug trafficking, it said.
Prosecutors said the suspects had brought the cannabis to waters off the southwestern coast where they waited for instructions to toss the packages overboard.
They then retrieved the packages with rafts to smuggle them into Taiwan, the statement said.
The seized cannabis had a market value of more than NT$3.5 billion (US$107.77 million), the statement said.
In other news, the Yunlin District Prosecutors’ Office on Tuesday indicted a former National Communications Commission (NCC) member in connection with his work for a telecom accused of fraud.
Hsiao Chi-hung (蕭祈宏), who left the NCC in 2022, was indicted for contravening revolving door prohibitions in the Public Functionary Service Act (公務員服務法) by working as a consultant for Tel25 Corp, the office said.
Hsiao was previously questioned and released on NT$500,000 bail after prosecutors indicted Tel25’s owner, surnamed Chen (陳), and 21 others in January on charges including money laundering and aggravated fraud.
Prosecutors allege that Tel25 used its business activities as a cover to collect personal data on Taiwanese and foreign nationals to use in false know-your-customer authorizations.
It then used that information to sell prepaid SIM cards with international roaming and Internet services — which are favored by fraud rings because they are difficult to track — earning more than NT$600 million in illegal profits over three years, prosecutors said.
The NCC said in a news release that it was “shocked and disappointed” by the accusations against Hsiao, but would cooperate fully with prosecutors.
To help combat fraud, the commission said it has worked with telecoms to block 8.24 million text messages, 18.84 million international calls to Taiwan and disconnected 1,566 telephone numbers between March last year and February.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
DEADLOCK: As the commission is unable to forum a quorum to review license renewal applications, the channel operators are not at fault and can air past their license date The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday said that the Public Television Service (PTS) and 36 other television and radio broadcasters could continue airing, despite the commission’s inability to meet a quorum to review their license renewal applications. The licenses of PTS and the other channels are set to expire between this month and June. The National Communications Commission Organization Act (國家通訊傳播委員會組織法) stipulates that the commission must meet the mandated quorum of four to hold a valid meeting. The seven-member commission currently has only three commissioners. “We have informed the channel operators of the progress we have made in reviewing their license renewal applications, and