Committee of Illegal Party Asset Settlement Chairman Wellington Koo (顧立雄) yesterday announced his picks for committee members, while confirming the appointment of Agency Against Corruption Deputy Director-General Hung Pai-ken (洪培根) as deputy chairman.
Koo said he knows that the Ministry of Justice’s Prosecutors’ Personnel Review Committee opposed the appointment of Hung — who is to quit his post to join the committee when it becomes active next month — but Koo asked that prosecutors show “forbearance and understanding.”
The post of assets committee secretary-general is to be filled by Chang Hung-tse (張弘澤), counselor of review and evaluations with the Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission, Koo said.
Koo said he has appointed Lo Cheng-chung (羅承宗), associate professor of financial and economic law at Southern Taiwan University of Science and Technology, and Shih Chin-fang (施錦芳), former commissioner of the Pingtung County Government Tax Bureau, as full-time committee members, while a third full-time member would be appointed later.
The committee’s eight part-time members are former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) spokesperson Yang Wei-chung (楊偉中); former Social Democratic Party legislative candidate Lee Yen-jong (李晏榕); Judicial Reform Foundation secretary-general Lin Che-wei (林哲瑋); National Chengchi University professor of history Li Fu-chung (李福鐘); accountant Jao Yueh-chin (饒月琴); and lawyers Wu Yu-hsueh (吳雨學), Yuan Hsiu-hui (袁秀慧) and Chang Shih-hsing (張世興), Koo said.
Premier Lin Chuan (林全) gave him “a lot of latitude and trust” in the appointments, Koo said, quoting the premier as saying: “I have no objections whatsoever.”
“Achieving a balance between the political parties was difficult, because committee members cannot hold positions in a party or be an elected representative, while pan-blue camp politicians I spoke to said the requirements put them in a difficult position,” Koo said. “In the end, the appointments were based on professional credentials and competence.”
Koo said Lin Che-wei was selected because he was involved in government transparency groups, such as Watchout Co and online community G0V.tw, and is to assist in making committee operations more transparent and use information technology to better communicate with the public.
KMT Deputy Secretary-General Lin Te-fu (林德福) said he had “no comment” on the appointments.
He said that Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers practiced “majority violence,” using floor votes to quash dissent.
He called the Act Governing the Handling of Ill-gotten Properties by Political Parties and Their Affiliate Organizations (政黨及其附隨組織不當取得財產處理條例) “illegal and unconstitutional.”
KMT Legislator Sufin Siluko (廖國棟) said Koo is a “deep-green person” and the party asset settlement process will “predictably develop a complete pro-green bias.”
The appointees are “controversial people” who will make reconciliation between parties “utterly impossible,” Sufin said.
“Taiwanese society will become more fragmented and partisan because the committee is a source of chaos,” Sufin said.
DPP Legislator Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) said the KMT should “face the facts and deal with [its assets] as soon as possible, instead of continuing with its futile resistance.”
“If the KMT position is that the law is illegal or unconstitutional, it should specify what clauses are a breach of the law or the Constitution,” Lee Chun-yi said.
ENDEAVOR MANTA: The ship is programmed to automatically return to its designated home port and would self-destruct if seized by another party The Endeavor Manta, Taiwan’s first military-specification uncrewed surface vehicle (USV) tailor-made to operate in the Taiwan Strait in a bid to bolster the nation’s asymmetric combat capabilities made its first appearance at Kaohsiung’s Singda Harbor yesterday. Taking inspiration from Ukraine’s navy, which is using USVs to force Russia’s Black Sea fleet to take shelter within its own ports, CSBC Taiwan (台灣國際造船) established a research and development unit on USVs last year, CSBC chairman Huang Cheng-hung (黃正弘) said. With the exception of the satellite guidance system and the outboard motors — which were purchased from foreign companies that were not affiliated with Chinese-funded
PERMIT REVOKED: The influencer at a news conference said the National Immigration Agency was infringing on human rights and persecuting Chinese spouses Chinese influencer “Yaya in Taiwan” (亞亞在台灣) yesterday evening voluntarily left Taiwan, despite saying yesterday morning that she had “no intention” of leaving after her residence permit was revoked over her comments on Taiwan being “unified” with China by military force. The Ministry of the Interior yesterday had said that it could forcibly deport the influencer at midnight, but was considering taking a more flexible approach and beginning procedures this morning. The influencer, whose given name is Liu Zhenya (劉振亞), departed on a 8:45pm flight from Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) to Fuzhou, China. Liu held a news conference at the airport at 7pm,
Authorities yesterday elaborated on the rules governing Employment Gold Cards after a US cardholder was barred from entering Taiwan for six years after working without a permit during a 2023 visit. American YouTuber LeLe Farley was barred after already being approved for an Employment Gold Card, he said in a video published on his channel on Saturday. Farley, who has more than 420,000 subscribers on his YouTube channel, was approved for his Gold Card last month, but was told at a check-in counter at the Los Angeles International Airport that he could not enter Taiwan. That was because he previously participated in two
SECURITY RISK: If there is a conflict between China and Taiwan, ‘there would likely be significant consequences to global economic and security interests,’ it said China remains the top military and cyber threat to the US and continues to make progress on capabilities to seize Taiwan, a report by US intelligence agencies said on Tuesday. The report provides an overview of the “collective insights” of top US intelligence agencies about the security threats to the US posed by foreign nations and criminal organizations. In its Annual Threat Assessment, the agencies divided threats facing the US into two broad categories, “nonstate transnational criminals and terrorists” and “major state actors,” with China, Russia, Iran and North Korea named. Of those countries, “China presents the most comprehensive and robust military threat
RSS