A vow by China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) to investigate Minister of the Interior Liu Shyh-fang’s (劉世芳) nephew is a case of transnational repression and is detrimental to cross-strait interactions, Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said in an interview published yesterday.
On Friday, Hong Kong newspaper Ta Kung Pao (大公報) reported that Liu had received political donations from her nephew Yen Wen-chun (顏文群).
Yen holds executive positions at three firms in China, the Chinese state-owned publication said.
Photo: Taipei Times
The TAO said that it is looking into the issue and that Beijing would not allow those who support Taiwanese independence and ruin cross-strait relations to use money earned in China to undermine Beijing.
The office in January listed Liu as a “diehard Taiwanese independence separatist,” and banned her and members of her family from entering China and its territories.
The sanctions also ban businesses associated with “separatists” from operating in China, applicable for life.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been waging legal warfare against Taiwan since 2024 with its “22 guidelines,” Chiu told the Chinese-language Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) in the interview.
The guidelines grant Beijing the pretext to launch investigations into people it suspects of supporting Taiwanese independence, he said.
The “22 guidelines” could result in the death penalty and even if the CCP is unable to bring those it accuses to court, they could be tried in absentia, he said.
For relatives of those accused or the accused themselves who are doing business in China, the guidelines allow the CCP to confiscate their property and assets, Chiu said, adding that the CCP encourages people to report incidents of “separatism.”
The laws cross “every line of the civilized world,” he said.
Yen made the donations in 2019 and only started working in China in 2023, Chiu said.
Yen is innocent in the matter, as he is just a relative of Liu’s and might not even know her that well, he added.
The council denounces the TAO’s actions as a clear abuse of state authority aimed at distorting personal information to oppress and intimidate people to advance political goals, Chiu said.
The TAO’s brutish actions, which run contrary to the rule of law, serve only to damage efforts to maintain normal cross-strait relations, Chiu said.
Taiwanese should reassess investing and doing business in China, as the economic and political risks have sharply increased over the past few years, he added.
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