Former Japanese vice minister of defense Yasuhide Nakayama on Friday denied allegations made by a former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmaker, who said Nakayama had said President William Lai (賴清德) plans to target certain people.
“Regarding the statement circulated on social media on April 25, 2025, in which Mr. Tsai Cheng-yuan [蔡正元] alleges that ‘Yasuhide Nakayama conveyed that President Lai Ching-te intended to target certain individuals’ — I, Yasuhide Nakayama, categorically and unequivocally deny these allegations,” Nakayama wrote on Facebook.
“These claims are entirely fabricated, and I reserve the right to take appropriate legal action, if necessary,” he said.
Photo: Taipei Times
Nakayama’s statement, written in Japanese, Chinese and English, was published on two Facebook pages he uses, with a link to a news story about Tsai’s Facebook post.
Tsai on Friday had written on Facebook that “former Japanese vice defense minister Yasuhide Nakayama told me through someone at the beginning of this month that Lai Ching-te is out to get me, Kuo Jeng-liang (郭正亮) and Fu Kun-chi.”
Tsai is a former lawmaker from the KMT who served in the Legislative Yuan between 2002 and 2016, Kuo is a former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmaker who quit the party in May 2023 and Fu is a veteran KMT lawmaker, who has been the opposition party’s caucus whip since his four-year term started in February last year.
Tsai said that during a court hearing on Friday afternoon regarding his appeal against his embezzlement conviction, the prosecutors “suddenly” asked the court to impose restrictions on him traveling abroad, raise his bail or order him to wear an electronic tag.
The court ruled that Tsai needed to wear an electronic tag.
Tsai said this was the doing of Lai’s people, adding that a friend had told him that if the tag had a bad signal, people could accuse him of not wearing the tag and contravening the court order.
There was no immediate response from Lai or the DPP about Tsai’s allegations.
The High Court said that as Tsai was found guilty of embezzlement by the Taipei District Court in 2021 and had made trips abroad recently, he was ordered to wear an electronic tag to reduce flight risk during his appeal.
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