Control Yuan members yesterday proposed censuring the Ministry of Finance (MOF) and Ministry of Justice (MOJ) for their failure to successfully curb financial crime in the past decade.
"Official censure was proposed because we perceived that the two ministries should be responsible for failing to prevent the occurrence of serious financial crimes," the control Yuan report stated.
Also the ministries were incapable of redressing the crimes and their effects through legal and administrative action, a the report said.
The investigation, initiated by four Control Yuan members -- Huang Huang-hsiung (
The MOF was particularly culpable since some of the irregularities cited in the report happened more than a decade ago yet few, if any, measures had been implemented to stop them recurring, the report said.
The ministry deserved censure for its silence and for what appeared to be conniving to minimize the attention paid to financial crimes afterwards.
The MOF should have at least carried out regular checks on financial institutions and spotted the deteriorating condition of banks and credit co-ops sooner, the report said.
The ministry needs to improve its handling of seriously indebted financial institutions. The practice of merely sending banks with high non-performing loan (NPL) ratios written reminders that they should find ways to lower their ratios was simply inadequate, the report said.
Tougher methods of spotting problems and solving them were needed.
The MOF was also faulted by the Control Yuan members for failing to set up an information database on previous financial crimes which, they said, would help the government to spot weaknesses in the financial supervisory system that were open to criminal exploitation.
The Control Yuan members also urged financial authorities to devise and enforce better and clearer rules of corporate governance and transparency.
"The lack of a mechanism to monitor companies' internal management through required information transparency has impaired the government's ability to nose out falsified accounts and other forms of fraud," the panel said.
The Ministry of Justice was also reproved because of its tardiness in prosecuting and adjudicating financial crimes.
"The Control Yuan investigation found that the judicial authorities failed to finalize nearly one-fifth of the 101 financial criminal cases within the laid-down three-month deadline. The ratio was extreme and the ministry therefore needs to be disciplined for overlooking the problem," the report said.
DEFENSE: The National Security Bureau promised to expand communication and intelligence cooperation with global partners and enhance its strategic analytical skills China has not only increased military exercises and “gray zone” tactics against Taiwan this year, but also continues to recruit military personnel for espionage, the National Security Bureau (NSB) said yesterday in a report to the Legislative Yuan. The bureau submitted the report ahead of NSB Director-General Tsai Ming-yen’s (蔡明彥) appearance before the Foreign and National Defense Committee today. Last year, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) conducted “Joint Sword-2024A and B” military exercises targeting Taiwan and carried out 40 combat readiness patrols, the bureau said. In addition, Chinese military aircraft entered Taiwan’s airspace 3,070 times last year, up about
Taiwan is stepping up plans to create self-sufficient supply chains for combat drones and increase foreign orders from the US to counter China’s numerical superiority, a defense official said on Saturday. Commenting on condition of anonymity, the official said the nation’s armed forces are in agreement with US Admiral Samuel Paparo’s assessment that Taiwan’s military must be prepared to turn the nation’s waters into a “hellscape” for the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Paparo, the commander of the US Indo-Pacific Command, reiterated the concept during a Congressional hearing in Washington on Wednesday. He first coined the term in a security conference last
A magnitude 4.3 earthquake struck eastern Taiwan's Hualien County at 8:31am today, according to the Central Weather Administration (CWA). The epicenter of the temblor was located in Hualien County, about 70.3 kilometers south southwest of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 23.2km, according to the administration. There were no immediate reports of damage resulting from the quake. The earthquake's intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a temblor, was highest in Taitung County, where it measured 3 on Taiwan's 7-tier intensity scale. The quake also measured an intensity of 2 in Hualien and Nantou counties, the CWA said.
The Overseas Community Affairs Council (OCAC) yesterday announced a fundraising campaign to support survivors of the magnitude 7.7 earthquake that struck Myanmar on March 28, with two prayer events scheduled in Taipei and Taichung later this week. “While initial rescue operations have concluded [in Myanmar], many survivors are now facing increasingly difficult living conditions,” OCAC Minister Hsu Chia-ching (徐佳青) told a news conference in Taipei. The fundraising campaign, which runs through May 31, is focused on supporting the reconstruction of damaged overseas compatriot schools, assisting students from Myanmar in Taiwan, and providing essential items, such as drinking water, food and medical supplies,
RSS