The High Court last night granted prosecutors' request to detain six retired and active Taiwanese military personnel and a Chinese man indicted for leaking military secrets to China.
The ruling can be appealed.
Photo: Chang Wen-chuan, Taipei Times
In a summary of the ruling read by a court spokesperson, the court said the seven people were indicted on charges related to contraventions of the National Security Act (國家安全法), which carry a minimum sentence of five years in prison.
It decided that given the seriousness of their alleged crimes and their potential flight risk, they were ordered to be detained for three months, the maximum allowed for defendants during a trial.
One of the defendants, Yang Chien-hui (楊千慧), admitted to all charges and was deemed unlikely to collude, so she would not be held incommunicado.
The remaining six suspects would be detained incommunicado, the court said.
Earlier yesterday, the High Prosecutors' Office indicted the seven for contravening the National Security Act, the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法) and the Criminal Code of the Armed Forces (陸海空軍刑法).
The defendants include a Chinese man named Ding Xiaohu (丁小琥), or Ting Siu-fu in Cantonese, who holds a Hong Kong passport, as well as six military personnel, identified as Wang Wen-hao (王文豪), Tan Chun-ming (譚俊明), Lu Fang-chi (呂芳契), Chiu Han-lin (邱翰林), Yang Chien-hui and Yang Po-chih (楊博智).
Prosecutors allege that Ding recruited retired officers Wang, Tan and two others surnamed Chang (張) and Ho (何) who have since died as members of a network that developed contacts and gathered classified information.
The four then took advantage of their connections in the military to recruit active and retired personnel, including Lu, Chiu, Yang Chien-hui and Yang Po-chih, prosecutors said.
More than NT$11.12 million (US$356,444) was transferred to Taiwan to fund the criminal operations by an associate named Chen Chun-an (陳俊安), according to information provided by prosecutors, the Investigation Bureau and the Ministry of National Defense.
Official descriptions of the case have not pinpointed when these actions took place, but according to local media, Ding began recruiting people for his network in 2018 and began actual spy activities in 2023.
The case was discovered by judicial authorities last year.
Also yesterday, the Taipei District Prosecutors' Office indicted Ding, Wang and Chen for money laundering and contraventions of the Banking Act (銀行法).
Charges against Chang and Ho, both deceased, were dropped.
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