The Ministry of Justice yesterday confirmed that the controversial Act for the Control and Punish-ment of Banditry (懲治盜-穇屭?, better known as the "Bandit law," is soon to be abolished.
The decision was made at a special cross-ministerial meeting coordinated by the justice ministry yesterday.
Before abolishing the act, the ministry is to incorporate some elements of the law into other sections of the Criminal Code, according to officials at the ministry's department of prosecutorial affairs.
Before making the decision, the officials said, the ministry consulted the Judicial Yuan, the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of National Defense, among others, about abolishing the act.
The defense ministry had apparently emphasized the need to retain provisions of the act covering forcible occupation of military areas and stealing or destroying military assets.
Many legal experts have argued that the law, enacted in 1944 during the civil war in China, lapsed a long time ago.
They cite a sunset clause that requires an annual renewal to keep the law in effect.
Since then, the law has not been renewed on several occasions, with the first lapse taking place in 1945.
Human rights activists have also lobbied for the act's abolishment, pointing out that some of its provisions violate universal human rights.
Probably the most controversial aspect of the act is that many of the crimes punishable under it carry mandatory death sen-tences, and yet so much of the criteria for prosecution under the act is wide-ranging and vague.
The act jumped back into the public's consciousness recently with the execution of eight death row prisoners who were convicted under it. The executions, which took place on Oct. 7, included the notorious kidnapper, murderer and rapist Chen Chin-hsing (3窄i?).
The only ones left who have been charged under the act but not yet executed are the famous Hsichih Trio.
The three accused in the Hsichih Trio case -- which is believed to be seriously flawed by human rights groups because their convictions were obtained on the basis of confessions which the accused men said were extracted under torture -- were given mandatory death sentences under the act eight years ago.
However, Su Chien-ho (蘇建和), Liu Bin-lang (劉秉-|),and Chuang Lin-hsun (2曭L勳) have been spared to this day due to the justice minister's reluctance to sign their death warrant.
Execution under the act has been a thorny issue for the justice ministry.
In August, the Council of Grand Justices, Taiwan's constitutional review authority, rejected an appeal for a reinterpretation of the validity of the bandit law, referring disputes over its validity to the legislature.
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
THUGGISH BEHAVIOR: Encouraging people to report independence supporters is another intimidation tactic that threatens cross-strait peace, the state department said China setting up an online system for reporting “Taiwanese independence” advocates is an “irresponsible and reprehensible” act, a US government spokesperson said on Friday. “China’s call for private individuals to report on alleged ‘persecution or suppression’ by supposed ‘Taiwan independence henchmen and accomplices’ is irresponsible and reprehensible,” an unnamed US Department of State spokesperson told the Central News Agency in an e-mail. The move is part of Beijing’s “intimidation campaign” against Taiwan and its supporters, and is “threatening free speech around the world, destabilizing the Indo-Pacific region, and deliberately eroding the cross-strait status quo,” the spokesperson said. The Chinese Communist Party’s “threats
RSS