The Shilin District Court has rejected a damages claim filed by 13 foreign nationals against a Taiwanese company linked in media reports to pagers that exploded in Lebanon in 2024, ruling that the plaintiffs failed to complete the required legal authorization procedures.
The case stems from a series of pager blasts on Sept. 17, 2024, involving devices used by members of Lebanon’s Shiite militant group Hezbollah.
The explosions killed and injured multiple people, including civilians, and drew international attention after reports citing anonymous US and other officials said the devices — identified as the AR-924 model — allegedly bore "Made in Taiwan" markings and were produced by Taiwan-based Gold Apollo Co.
Photo: Taipei Times file photo
The Shilin District Prosecutors Office later found that Gold Apollo had never manufactured an AR-924 pager model and that the devices involved were produced, traded and shipped overseas by an international corporation, Frontier Group Entity.
The presence of the Gold Apollo trademark on the pagers was due to a memorandum of understanding signed in 2022 between the company and Frontier Group Entity, prosecutors said.
Under the deal, Frontier Group Entity paid an annual brand licensing fee and agreed to purchase a certain volume of other Gold Apollo products, therefore obtaining authorization to use Gold Apollo’s products and trademark, they said.
Prosecutors said they found no evidence linking Taiwanese firms or individuals to the explosions and closed the criminal investigation in November 2024.
Despite that finding, 13 foreign nationals living overseas authorized lawyers in Taiwan to file a civil lawsuit seeking damages from Gold Apollo and applied for litigation assistance.
However, the plaintiffs did not sign the civil complaint or the application for litigation aid, and their lawyers failed to submit powers of attorney authenticated by Taiwan’s overseas representative offices, the Shilin District Court said.
Under law, when a power of attorney is issued abroad and its authenticity is disputed, it must be certified by a Taiwanese overseas mission to be deemed valid.
Gold Apollo challenged the authenticity of the authorization documents, the court said.
On Nov. 10 last year, the court ordered that procedural deficiencies be corrected within 40 days.
Although the ruling was served a week later, the plaintiffs failed to submit the required authenticated documents before the deadline and did not provide sufficient justification for the delay, the court said.
As a result, the court ruled that the lawsuit and the application for litigation assistance were unlawful and dismissed them on Monday last week. The decision can be appealed.
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
BREACH OF CONTRACT: The bus operators would seek compensation and have demanded that the manufacturer replace the chips with ones that meet regulations Two bus operators found to be using buses with China-made chips are to demand that the original manufacturers replace the systems and provide compensation for breach of contract, the Veterans Affairs Council said yesterday. Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Michelle Lin (林楚茵) yesterday said that Da Nan Bus Co and Shin-Shin Bus Co Ltd have fielded a total of 82 buses that are using Chinese chips. The bus models were made by Tron-E, while the systems provider was CYE Electronics, Lin said. Lin alleged that the buses were using chips manufactured by Huawei subsidiary HiSilicon Co, which presents a national security risk if the
The National Immigration Agency has banned two Chinese from returning to Taiwan, after they published social media content it described as disrespectful to national sovereignty. The agency imposed a two-month ban on a Chinese man surnamed Liang (梁) and a permanent ban on a woman surnamed Yang (楊), an influencer with 23 million followers, in October last year and last week respectively. Minister of the Interior Liu Shyh-fang (劉世芳) yesterday said on the sidelines of a legislative meeting that Chinese visitors to Taiwan are required to comply with the rules and regulations governing their entry permits. The government has handled the ban and
RSS