An advisory officer for the Lienchiang County (Matsu) government has been impeached by the Control Yuan for soliciting and accepting bribes, engaging in grant fraud and unilaterally ordering the culling of 83 sika deer.
The official, Liu Te-chuan (劉德全), committed the offenses since 2016 while serving as head of the county’s Industrial Development Division and Public Works Department, the Control Yuan said in a news release on Wednesday.
Liu solicited and received about NT$1 million (US$30,807) in bribes from three companies bidding for county government contracts between 2016 and 2020, it said.
Photo: Yu Chao-fu, Taipei Times
In 2018 and 2019, while serving on a committee awarding industrial innovation grants, Liu knowingly approved five applications for more than NT$3 million in funds that his two sons had filed via shell companies or companies belonging to acquaintances, the Control Yuan said.
In 2020, Liu ordered a company that won an animal control contract from the county government to cull 83 sika deer on Daciou Island (大坵) — an uninhabited former military outpost north of Beigan Island (北竿) — even though the contract made no mention of culling deer and the government had not formulated plans to do so.
The contractor used snares to capture the deer and inhumanely killed them by cutting their throats or stabbing them in their vital organs in contravention of animal welfare laws, the statement said.
The Lienchiang District Court last year found Liu guilty on five charges, including accepting bribes and breach of trust by a public official, and sentenced him to nine years and 10 months in prison, the Control Yuan said.
The Lienchiang County Government on Wednesday said it “respected” the ruling, and would await a subsequent judgement from the Disciplinary Court for civil servants, to which Liu’s case has been referred.
The Disciplinary Court could impose a range of administrative penalties on Liu, including demotion, revocation of his status as a civil servant, a fine, or a reduction or cancelation of his pension.
Alain Robert, known as the "French Spider-Man," praised Alex Honnold as exceptionally well-prepared after the US climber completed a free solo ascent of Taipei 101 yesterday. Robert said Honnold's ascent of the 508m-tall skyscraper in just more than one-and-a-half hours without using safety ropes or equipment was a remarkable achievement. "This is my life," he said in an interview conducted in French, adding that he liked the feeling of being "on the edge of danger." The 63-year-old Frenchman climbed Taipei 101 using ropes in December 2004, taking about four hours to reach the top. On a one-to-10 scale of difficulty, Robert said Taipei 101
Nipah virus infection is to be officially listed as a category 5 notifiable infectious disease in Taiwan in March, while clinical treatment guidelines are being formulated, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday. With Nipah infections being reported in other countries and considering its relatively high fatality rate, the centers on Jan. 16 announced that it would be listed as a notifiable infectious disease to bolster the nation’s systematic early warning system and increase public awareness, the CDC said. Bangladesh reported four fatal cases last year in separate districts, with three linked to raw date palm sap consumption, CDC Epidemic Intelligence
Two Taiwanese prosecutors were questioned by Chinese security personnel at their hotel during a trip to China’s Henan Province this month, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday. The officers had personal information on the prosecutors, including “when they were assigned to their posts, their work locations and job titles,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesman Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said. On top of asking about their agencies and positions, the officers also questioned the prosecutors about the Cross-Strait Joint Crime-Fighting and Judicial Mutual Assistance Agreement, a pact that serves as the framework for Taiwan-China cooperation on combating crime and providing judicial assistance, Liang
US climber Alex Honnold left Taiwan this morning a day after completing a free-solo ascent of Taipei 101, a feat that drew cheers from onlookers and gained widespread international attention. Honnold yesterday scaled the 101-story skyscraper without a rope or safety harness. The climb — the highest urban free-solo ascent ever attempted — took just more than 90 minutes and was streamed live on Netflix. It was covered by major international news outlets including CNN, the New York Times, the Guardian and the Wall Street Journal. As Honnold prepared to leave Taiwan today, he attracted a crowd when he and his wife, Sanni,
RSS