China’s apparent manipulation of organized crime groups in Taiwan will not be tolerated, Minister of the Interior Yeh Jiunn-rong (葉俊榮) said yesterday.
“The government will not tolerate such manipulation and the infiltration of Taiwan’s democratic society from abroad. We are resolved to take action and face the problem, and will conduct a full and in-depth investigation,” Yeh said during a plenary session at the Legislative Yuan in Taipei.
“We are a nation based on the legal framework of our Constitution, and the people have strong faith in our democratic institutions. Therefore, we must deal with this matter in a serious manner, fully investigate it and take up measures to counter it,” he added.
Photo: CNA
Yeh’s remarks followed a report yesterday by the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the sister newspaper of the Taipei Times), which suggested that the Chinese Ministry of State Security has been operating an “external liaison office” in Xiamen, China, that communicates with and provides financial assistance to organized crime groups in Taiwan.
Citing sources in the nation’s intelligence agencies, the Liberty Times said that the external liaison office is nominally an organization at the provincial level under China’s Taiwan Affairs Office that handles cross-strait exchange programs, but is in reality an intelligence operations center for political warfare, covert espionage activities and related “united front” work against Taiwan.
As the local unit of the Chinese ministry, it is mainly tasked with monitoring Taiwanese organized crime groups that have business and other activities in China, with the aim of recruiting and manipulating the groups into working for Beijing, the report said.
The external liaison office has successfully built up a good working relationship with Taiwan’s Bamboo Union and the Four Seas Gang, whose members receive funding to do Beijing’s bidding, the report added.
Senior members of the two groups who ran afoul of the law and fled to China to establish businesses or operate in the underground economy became easy targets for recruitment by Chinese intelligence agencies, as they had to collude with local officials to be able to operate and receive forms of political and police protection, the report said.
New Power Party Legislator Hsu Yung-ming (徐永明) yesterday urged the government to get a handle on the situation and determine if the Chinese government had a direct hand in attacks on university students by members of the Chinese Unity Promotion Party (CUPP) at a music festival in Taipei on Sunday.
“Shanghai Municipal Taiwan Affairs Office Director Li Wenhui (李文輝) was at the ‘Sing! China: Shanghai-Taipei Music Festival.’ We must find out if he played a role in the violence by CUPP members against students,” Hsu said.
“We know CUPP Chairman Chang An-le (張安樂) is a gang boss and that he has close links to Chinese authorities,” Hsu said. “It looks like red [China] and black [organized crime organizations] are joining forces against Taiwan.”
“It is also important to find out if these criminal gangs and the CUPP are receiving large sums of money from China to finance their activities in Taiwan,” he added.
ESCALATING TENSIONS: The US called for restraint and meaningful dialogue after Beijing threatened Taiwanese independence advocates with the death sentence The US on Monday condemned China’s “escalatory and destabilizing language and actions” toward Taiwan after Beijing last week announced new guidelines to punish supporters of Taiwanese independence. Asked about the guidelines, which included the death sentence for “diehard” independence advocates, US Department of State spokesman Matthew Miller said: “We strongly condemn the escalatory and destabilizing language and actions from PRC [People’s Republic of China] officials.” “We continue to urge restraint and no unilateral change to the status quo,” he said at the press briefing. The US urges China to “engage in meaningful dialogue with Taiwan,” Miller said, adding that “threats and legal
DEATH THREAT: A MAC official said that it has urged Beijing to avoid creating barriers that would impede exchanges across the Strait, but it continues to do so People should avoid unnecessary travel to China after Beijing issued 22 guidelines allowing its courts to try in absentia and sentence to death “Taiwan independence separatists,” the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday as it raised its travel alert for China, including Hong Kong and Macau, to “orange.” The guidelines published last week “severely threaten the personal safety of Taiwanese traveling to China, Hong Kong and Macau,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesman Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) told a news conference in Taipei. “Following a comprehensive assessment, the government considers it necessary to elevate the travel alert to orange from yellow,” Liang said. Beijing has
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday said that the Chinese Communist Party was planning and implementing “major” reforms, ahead of a political conclave that is expected to put economic recovery high on the agenda. Chinese policymakers have struggled to reignite growth since late 2022, when restrictions put in place due to the COVID-19 pandemic were lifted. The world’s second-largest economy is beset by a debt crisis in the property sector, persistently low consumption and high unemployment among young people. Policymakers “are planning and implementing major measures to further deepen reform in a comprehensive manner,” Xi said in a speech at the Great Hall
WATER CONCERNS: The CWA encouraged people to conserve water, as fewer typhoons would bring less rain, and the plum rain season brought in only 60% of average rainfall About two to four typhoons are forecast to come close to Taiwan between now and November, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday, as it also forecast that extreme heat would persist throughout the week, only dropping by 1°C after Friday. The number of typhoons is slightly lower than the average of three to five, reflecting a weakening El Nino weather pattern and the possibility of a La Nina pattern approaching, CWA Weather Forecast Center Director Chen Yi-liang (陳怡良) told a news conference in Taipei. While typically fewer typhoons develop under such conditions, their routes would be more likely to pass near