■ CRIME
Kuo Kuan-ying indicted
Prosecutors charged former Toronto-based Government Information Office official Kuo Kuan-ying (郭冠英) yesterday with defamation for making personal attacks on former Presidential Office secretary-general Chen Shih-meng (陳師孟) and Contemporary Magazine editor-in-chief Chin Heng-wei (金恆煒). Chen and Chin filed a lawsuit on April 1, accusing Kuo of publishing articles in which he called them“violent pro-independence dogs” and other names. Using the pen name Fan Lan-chin (范蘭欽), Kuo on Dec. 15 described the two as “violent pro-independence supporters” and “eunuch’s dogs,” adding that he himself was a “high-class Mainlander” and that Chen and Chin were “high-class Mainlander dogs,” the pair said. The indictment said Kuo’s comments had damaged Chen and Chin’s reputations. Kuo was stripped of his civil servant status in March in the wake of a controversy over online articles he wrote under Fan and other pen names that smeared Taiwan and Taiwanese.
■ SOCIETY
No decision on tombs site
The Tainan City Government said on Thursday that no decision would be made on relocating a group of ancient tombs unearthed at a military residential compound in January until the end of this month. Department of Culture and Tourism Director Hsu Geng-hsiu (許耿修) said the city government asked a professional archeology group to examine the site, where at least 60 tombs dating back to the late Ming Dynasty and early Qing Dynasty are located. The tombs were unearthed in Shuijiao She (水交社), one of the largest military residential compounds in Tainan, when workers were clearing land for the development of new roads. The site is believed to be a graveyard for people who died during the era when Koxinga’s son, Zheng Jing (鄭經), ruled the Tainan area at the end of the Ming Dynasty. Artifacts unearthed from the site so far include tea pots, bronze coins and ceramics.
■ CROSS-STRAIT TIES
Wu in Changsha for forum
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) arrived yesterday in Changsha, Hunan Province, to attend the KMT-Chinese Communist Party (CCP) forum on economic and cultural exchanges that begins today. Before boarding a chartered flight at Taipei’s Songshan Airport yesterday, Wu told reporters the forum would focus on education and culture. Talks will be held on how to preserve and ensure the continuation of Chinese culture while trying to innovate, he said, adding that other subjects include cross-strait cooperation in the promotion of the culture industry and educational exchanges. Wu said the forum was no longer limited to KMT and CCP participants.
■ POLITICS
Ex-lawmaker appeals
Chang Sho-wen (張碩文) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), who last month lost his legislative seat because of vote-buying, filed an appeal with the Control Yuan yesterday, calling on it to impeach the prosecutors and judges in charge of his case. The Tainan Branch of the Taiwan High Court on June 30 upheld a lower court’s decision that invalidated Chang’s legislative victory last year. The final verdict said the election was not fair and valid because Chang’s father bought votes for his son. Chang said the witness statement was fabricated by prosecutors and that the lawyer of a suspect-turned-prosecution-witness and prosecutors did not record the whole investigation.
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
DEADLOCK: As the commission is unable to forum a quorum to review license renewal applications, the channel operators are not at fault and can air past their license date The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday said that the Public Television Service (PTS) and 36 other television and radio broadcasters could continue airing, despite the commission’s inability to meet a quorum to review their license renewal applications. The licenses of PTS and the other channels are set to expire between this month and June. The National Communications Commission Organization Act (國家通訊傳播委員會組織法) stipulates that the commission must meet the mandated quorum of four to hold a valid meeting. The seven-member commission currently has only three commissioners. “We have informed the channel operators of the progress we have made in reviewing their license renewal applications, and
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
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