Government officials may have to reimburse lost state funds if they are found to have been negligent in handling their duties, the head of the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday.
DGBAS Director-General Hsu Chang-yao (許璋瑤) made the remarks in response to questions on whether former minister of foreign affairs James Huang (黃志芳) and former vice premier Chiou I-jen (邱義仁) would have to take responsibility for US$30 million in government funds that went missing after being used in an initiative the two men led in 2006 to establish diplomatic relations with Papua New Guinea.
The money was remitted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in September 2006 to an account in Singapore jointly held by two middlemen brokering the deal.
Hsu said that if Chiou and Huang were found to be negligent, they would have to reimburse the US$30 million to the government in compliance with the Audit Law.
The whereabouts of the funds remain unknown. Chiou and Huang contend that the money was embezzled by the middlemen — Ching Chi-ju (金紀玖) and Wu Shih-tsai (吳思材) — who were commissioned to help set up ties with Papua New Guinea.
Ching, who has a US passport, is believed to be hiding in California. Wu, a Singaporean who held Republic of China citizenship until 2006, is being held incommunicado in Taipei.
The case was brought to light by Huang at a news conference in Taipei on May 1 following a report on the case by a Singapore-based newspaper a day earlier.
Huang said that the middlemen were introduced to him in 2006 by Chiou, then the secretary-general of the National Security Council, to help facilitate negotiations with Papua New Guinea.
Chiou has been banned by prosecutors from leaving the country since early last week. Chiou, Huang and then deputy minister of national defense Ko Cheng-heng (柯承亨) resigned from their government posts on May 6.
Meanwhile, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which had earlier described the Papua New Guinea fund scandal as a botched diplomatic deal, yesterday urged the public to stop attacking secret diplomacy and defended the innocence of the three key government players.
DPP Secretary-General Lee Ying-yuan (李應元) told reporters after the party’s Central Standing Committee that the party had set up a task force to investigate the controversy and had interviewed Chiou and Huang, but not Ko, who is mourning the death of his father.
The task force yesterday briefed the committee on the first-stage investigation of the scandal. The report concluded that Chiou, Huang and Ko were innocent and they were only trying to secure one more diplomatic ally for the country.
Lee said that progress was made during the process, but the party regretted that the money had disappeared when Huang asked the two intermediaries, Ching and Wu, to return it.
The party will leave it to the judiciary to recover the money and appropriate blame, Lee said.
Lee dismissed allegations that Huang had said Chiou should be mainly held responsible for the incident.
He said “there was no such thing” and that Chiou, Huang and Ko trusted each other.
Expressing regret and apologizing for the failed attempt to forge an ally for Taiwan, Lee said the DPP would correct any wrongs if it had made mistakes, but he hoped the public would refrain from unnecessarily attacking the party.
An alleged US government plan to encourage Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) to form a joint venture with Intel to boost US chipmaking would place the Taiwanese foundry giant in a more disadvantageous position than proposed tariffs on imported chips, a semiconductor expert said yesterday. If TSMC forms a joint venture with its US rival, it faces the risk of technology outflow, said Liu Pei-chen (劉佩真), a researcher at the Taiwan Industry Economics Database of the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research. A report by international financial services firm Baird said that Asia semiconductor supply chain talks suggest that the US government would
Starlux Airlines on Tuesday announced it is to launch new direct flights from Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport to Ontario, California, on June 2. The carrier said it plans to deploy the new-generation Airbus A350 on the Taipei-Ontario route. The Airbus A350 features a total of 306 seats, including four in first class, 26 in business class, 36 in premium economy and 240 in economy. According to Starlux’s initial schedule, four flights would run between Taoyuan and Ontario per week: Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. Flights are to depart from Taoyuan at 8:05pm and arrive in California at 5:05pm (local time), while return flights
Nearly 800 Indian tourists are to arrive this week on an incentive tour organized by Indian company Asian Painted Ltd, making it the largest tour group from the South Asian nation to visit since the COVID-19 pandemic. The travelers are scheduled to arrive in six batches from Sunday to Feb. 25 for five-day tours, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. The tour would take the travelers, most of whom are visiting Taiwan for the first time, to several tourist sites in Taipei and Yilan County, including tea houses in Taipei’s Maokong (貓空), Dadaocheng (大稻埕) and Ximending (西門町) areas. They would also visit
WANG RELEASED: A police investigation showed that an organized crime group allegedly taught their clients how to pretend to be sick during medical exams Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) and 11 others were released on bail yesterday, after being questioned for allegedly dodging compulsory military service or forging documents to help others avoid serving. Wang, 33, was catapulted into stardom for his role in the coming-of-age film Our Times (我的少女時代). Lately, he has been focusing on developing his entertainment career in China. The New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office last month began investigating an organized crime group that is allegedly helping men dodge compulsory military service using falsified documents. Police in New Taipei City Yonghe Precinct at the end of last month arrested the main suspect,
RSS