Lawmakers yesterday approved President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) nomination of Chiang Hui-ming (江惠民), chief prosecutor of Taiwan High Court’s Taichung branch, as the new prosecutor-general.
The confirmation vote was passed 84-1, with two invalid ballots, marking the highest number for a prosecutor-general nominee since the number of legislative seats was cut from 225 to 113 in 2008.
Outgoing Prosecutor-General Yen Da-ho (顏大和), whose term ends on May 7, had 62 votes, while Yen’s predecessor, Huang Shih-ming (黃世銘), received 75 votes.
Photo: Wang Yi-sung, Taipei Times
Before the vote, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus secretary-general Lee Yen-hsiu (李彥秀) said that her caucus considered Chiang’s nomination to be “unbiased” based on its evaluation of Chiang after a question-and-answer session at the legislature on Monday, adding that it would be open-minded going into the vote.
Despite the KMT caucus not imposing any restrictions on its members regarding the vote, only 12 of its 33 legislators voted: Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕), Johnny Chiang (江啟臣), Lin Te-fu (林德福), Lin Wei-chou (林為洲), Ko Chih-en (柯志恩), John Wu (吳志揚), Lo Ming-tsai (羅明才), Huang Chao-shun (黃昭順), Hsu Chen-wei (徐榛蔚), Hsu Chih-jung (徐志榮), Chen Hsueh-sheng (陳雪生) and Sufin Siluko.
Following the vote, Chiang Hui-ming said he would focus on three key areas: implement proposed judicial reforms to win back the public’s faith in the judiciary; promote human rights and procedural justice, with prosecutors upholding the rights of plaintiffs and defendants; and defend the impartiality and independence of investigations by prosecutors and investigators.
It is difficult to play the role of prosecutor well, as they must achieve a balance between criminal investigations and the protection of human rights, which puts procedural justice at the forefront of their work, he said.
Chiang Hui-ming, 63, is a graduate of National Taiwan University’s law school and has previously served as chief and head prosecutor of several district prosecutors’ offices, including those in Kaohsiung, Taichung, Miaoli and Pingtung, and in branches of the Taiwan High Prosecutors’ Office.
In his nearly 37-year career in law enforcement, he has worked on judicial reform and has helped the Ministry of Foreign Affairs have Taiwan removed from a list of drug-smuggling countries.
Additional reporting by Cheng Hung-ta and CNA
TRAGEDY: An expert said that the incident was uncommon as the chance of a ground crew member being sucked into an IDF engine was ‘minuscule’ A master sergeant yesterday morning died after she was sucked into an engine during a routine inspection of a fighter jet at an air base in Taichung, the Air Force Command Headquarters said. The officer, surnamed Hu (胡), was conducting final landing checks at Ching Chuan Kang (清泉崗) Air Base when she was pulled into the jet’s engine for unknown reasons, the air force said in a news release. She was transported to a hospital for emergency treatment, but could not be revived, it said. The air force expressed its deepest sympathies over the incident, and vowed to work with authorities as they
Police have issued warnings against traveling to Cambodia or Thailand when others have paid for the travel fare in light of increasing cases of teenagers, middle-aged and elderly people being tricked into traveling to these countries and then being held for ransom. Recounting their ordeal, one victim on Monday said she was asked by a friend to visit Thailand and help set up a bank account there, for which they would be paid NT$70,000 to NT$100,000 (US$2,136 to US$3,051). The victim said she had not found it strange that her friend was not coming along on the trip, adding that when she
A tourist who was struck and injured by a train in a scenic area of New Taipei City’s Pingsi District (平溪) on Monday might be fined for trespassing on the tracks, the Railway Police Bureau said yesterday. The New Taipei City Fire Department said it received a call at 4:37pm on Monday about an incident in Shifen (十分), a tourist destination on the Pingsi Railway Line. After arriving on the scene, paramedics treated a woman in her 30s for a 3cm to 5cm laceration on her head, the department said. She was taken to a hospital in Keelung, it said. Surveillance footage from a
INFRASTRUCTURE: Work on the second segment, from Kaohsiung to Pingtung, is expected to begin in 2028 and be completed by 2039, the railway bureau said Planned high-speed rail (HSR) extensions would blanket Taiwan proper in four 90-minute commute blocs to facilitate regional economic and livelihood integration, Railway Bureau Deputy Director-General Yang Cheng-chun (楊正君) said in an interview published yesterday. A project to extend the high-speed rail from Zuoying Station in Kaohsiung to Pingtung County’s Lioukuaicuo Township (六塊厝) is the first part of the bureau’s greater plan to expand rail coverage, he told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). The bureau’s long-term plan is to build a loop to circle Taiwan proper that would consist of four sections running from Taipei to Hualien, Hualien to
RSS