The government would soon review measures in place to test civil servants’ loyalty to the country, particularly measures that should be administered to those who have access to highly classified information, the Executive Yuan said yesterday.
The issue has been under close scrutiny following a series of highly publicized espionage cases, including one involving Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) member Ho Jen-chieh (何仁傑), who has been detained and held incommunicado since Saturday for allegedly spying for China while serving as assistant to then-minister of foreign affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮).
President William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday told a meeting of the DPP Central Standing Committee that party officials must from now on report their trips to China, Hong Kong and Macau prior to departure.
Photo courtesy of the Executive Yuan
Mainland Affairs Council Deputy Minister Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) also told a news conference in Taipei on Wednesday that the council is proposing an amendment to 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) that would regulate legislators’ visits to China.
Although the act stipulates that people engaging in business involving national security or confidential matters in agencies related to national defense, foreign affairs, technology, intelligence, mainland affairs or other related agencies should apply for permission to enter China, legislators have never abided by the rule, Liang said.
At the weekly Cabinet meeting yesterday, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) also asked Minister Without Portfolio Ma Yung-cheng (馬永成) to meet with national security officials and propose within two weeks ways to improve and enforce loyalty tests for government employees, Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a news conference after the meeting.
“The government has been cracking down on espionage cases in light of the increasingly intense infiltration of foreign hostile regimes. As hostile regimes often seek to infiltrate agencies handing highly sensitive information, the premier said that the government needs to bolster national security mechanisms while imposing severe sanctions on individuals breaching the National Security Act (國家安全法),” Lee quoted Cho as saying.
Article 4 of the Civil Service Employment Act (公務人員任用法) stipulates that civil servants involved in national security and major national interests need to undergo special identity checks, Lee said.
“The current system needs to be re-examined, whether it needs improvement or it has been loosely enforced. The system should prevent foreign hostile regimes from infiltrating government agencies,” she quoted Cho as saying.
The premier believes that most civil servants follow the law and work for the people, but the government needs to strengthen the current system to safeguard national security and protect our democratic way of life, Lee said.
“The current loyalty test is administered based on a government worker’s job level and title, rather than on the security level of the information to which they have access. This might be the general direction of the change that would be considered,” Lee said.
Directorate-General of Personnel Administration Director-General Su Chun-jung (蘇俊榮) said that diplomatic officers involved in Ho’s case underwent loyalty checks when they initially reported for jobs.
“We might consider administering loyalty checks annually,” Su said.
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The first of 10 new high-capacity trains purchased from South Korea’s Hyundai Rotem arrived at the Port of Taipei yesterday to meet the demands of an expanding metro network, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. The train completed a three-day, 1,200km voyage from the Port of Masan in South Korea, the company said. Costing NT$590 million (US$18.79 million) each, the new six-carriage trains feature a redesigned interior based on "human-centric" transportation concepts, TRTC said. The design utilizes continuous longitudinal seating to widen the aisles and optimize passenger flow, while also upgrading passenger information displays and driving control systems for a more comfortable
Taiwan's first indigenous defense submarine, the SS-711 Hai Kun (海鯤, or Narwhal), departed for its 13th sea trial at 7am today, marking its seventh submerged test, with delivery to the navy scheduled for July. The outing also marked its first sea deployment since President William Lai (賴清德) boarded the submarine for an inspection on March 19, drawing a crowd of military enthusiasts who gathered to show support. The submarine this morning departed port accompanied by CSBC Corp’s Endeavor Manta (奮進魔鬼魚號) uncrewed surface vessel and a navy M109 assault boat. Amid public interest in key milestones such as torpedo-launching operations and overnight submerged trials,
RSS