Two suspected gangsters were released on bail yesterday after being questioned by Taipei prosecutors over their involvement in an alleged assault on Tainan City Councilor Wang Ting-yu (王定宇).
Huang Ju-yi (黃如意) and Wu Yi-wei (吳奕偉) were released on bail of NT$300,000 and NT$100,000 respectively. They have been listed as defendants in the investigation.
Huang had tried to leave the country via Kinmen on Tuesday but was blocked and detained.
Wang held a press conference earlier on Tuesday, saying he had been held hostage, threatened and assaulted by Huang and his associates last Thursday as part of an alleged plot by pro-China gangsters.
Wang said the gangsters wanted revenge for his involvement in an incident involving Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS) Vice Chairman Zhang Mingqing (張銘清).
Zhang fell to the ground after being jostled by independence supporters led by Wang during a visit to the Confucius Temple in Tainan on Tuesday last week.
“Prosecutors decided to list them both as defendants, even though Wang said only Wu threatened him,” said Lin Chin-chun (林錦村), spokesman for the Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office.
Taipei Prosecutor Deng Ding-chiang (鄧定強) talked to Huang, Wu and Wang on Tuesday but made no detentions.
Huang was then detained in Kinmen later on Tuesday after he was caught trying to board a ferry to Xiamen, China. Huang told reporters he had not been told he must stay in the country.
The two men were detained for more questioning but released on bail and barred from leaving the country.
“What they said in their statements and conversations with prosecutors did not match up, so we still need to figure out who was lying,” Lin said.
Lin said Wang told prosecutors he had only met Huang about three times, while Huang said they had been friends for at least seven years.
In his account, Wang accused Wu of threatening that if he did not publicly apologize to Zhang, he might be killed by a “single shot.”
But Huang told prosecutors that Wu only said he would “beat Huang up” and not that he would shoot him.
Meanwhile, DPP Legislator Lin Shu-fen (林淑芬) yesterday urged Government Information Office (GIO) Minister Vanessa Shih (史亞平) to condemn news channels that aired the footage showing Huang demanding an apology from Wang.
Lin said showing the footage violated journalistic ethics.
In response, Shih said the GIO was against broadcasting violent footage, but it was the National Communications Commission’s responsibility to deal with the matter.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY FLORA WANG
Death row inmate Huang Lin-kai (黃麟凱), who was convicted for the double murder of his former girlfriend and her mother, is to be executed at the Taipei Detention Center tonight, the Ministry of Justice announced. Huang, who was a military conscript at the time, was convicted for the rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend, surnamed Wang (王), and the murder of her mother, after breaking into their home on Oct. 1, 2013. Prosecutors cited anger over the breakup and a dispute about money as the motives behind the double homicide. This is the first time that Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) has
BITTERLY COLD: The inauguration ceremony for US president-elect Donald Trump has been moved indoors due to cold weather, with the new venue lacking capacity A delegation of cross-party lawmakers from Taiwan, led by Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), for the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump, would not be able to attend the ceremony, as it is being moved indoors due to forecasts of intense cold weather in Washington tomorrow. The inauguration ceremony for Trump and US vice president-elect JD Vance is to be held inside the Capitol Rotunda, which has a capacity of about 2,000 people. A person familiar with the issue yesterday said although the outdoor inauguration ceremony has been relocated, Taiwan’s legislative delegation has decided to head off to Washington as scheduled. The delegation
TRANSPORT CONVENIENCE: The new ticket gates would accept a variety of mobile payment methods, and buses would be installed with QR code readers for ease of use New ticketing gates for the Taipei metro system are expected to begin service in October, allowing users to swipe with cellphones and select credit cards partnered with Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), the company said on Tuesday. TRTC said its gates in use are experiencing difficulty due to their age, as they were first installed in 2007. Maintenance is increasingly expensive and challenging as the manufacturing of components is halted or becoming harder to find, the company said. Currently, the gates only accept EasyCard, iPass and electronic icash tickets, or one-time-use tickets purchased at kiosks, the company said. Since 2023, the company said it
Another wave of cold air would affect Taiwan starting from Friday and could evolve into a continental cold mass, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Temperatures could drop below 10°C across Taiwan on Monday and Tuesday next week, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. Seasonal northeasterly winds could bring rain, he said. Meanwhile, due to the continental cold mass and radiative cooling, it would be cold in northern and northeastern Taiwan today and tomorrow, according to the CWA. From last night to this morning, temperatures could drop below 10°C in northern Taiwan, it said. A thin coat of snow
RSS