A former deputy chief of news desk at the Military News Agency, was on Wednesday sentenced to five years and six months in prison for espionage and attempting to recruit fellow officers to spy for China.
Lieutenant colonel Kung Fan-chia (孔繁嘉), 54, was convicted of violating the National Security Act (國家安全法) and of breaching his “official duties” by demanding or accepting bribes or other improper benefits in contravention of the Criminal Code, as the Military News Agency is a state media outlet managed by the Ministry of National Defense.
The Taoyuan District Court also ordered that the US$117,000 and 60,000 yuan (US$8.267) Kung received from his Chinese handlers be confiscated.
Photo: Chou Min-hung, Taipei Times
The ruling can be appealed.
Judicial investigators found that Kung in 2006 met with Chinese intelligence officials based in Xiamen City in China’s Fujian Province and agreed to spy for the Beijing government.
Kung thereafter sought fellow military officers to form a spy network to access confidential materials and reports on Taiwan’s armed forces.
He tried to recruit fellow officers, including those working at the Military News Agency, by offering rewards and promises of all-expense paid trips to Southeast Asian countries, where they met with Chinese officials who would entice them with monetary rewards to spy for China, investigators said.
In the ruling, the judges condemned Kung for “selling out his country” after being educated and trained by the Taiwanese military.
He “betrayed his official duties by accepting bribes for spying,” which had “brought dishonor to the military’s code of honor and state civil servants,” and had harmed the nation by secretly working for China to develop a spy network for more than 10 years,” the ruling said.
In a separate case, a Chinese woman surnamed Lin (林) was yesterday convicted of forgery of documents to obtain permanent resident status and sentenced to 14 months in prison, which can be commuted to a fine.
An investigation found that Lin had deceived local government agencies by using the identity papers of a friend — another Chinese woman surnamed Ou (歐), who was at the time married to a Taiwanese — to file for divorce, and forged other documents to gain permanent resident status to live and work in Taiwan.
After taking on Ou’s identity, Lin took 18 trips overseas between 2007 and 2018. The last time she applied to enter Taiwan in November 2022, she admitted to National Immigration Agency officers that she had used forged documents, leading to an investigation by public prosecutors in Kaohsiung.
In other developments, the Aviation Police Bureau yesterday charged a Chinese man surnamed Zhang (張), 55, of theft during flights to Taiwan this year.
Bureau investigators said that after receiving reports from air passengers of missing money and valuables from carry-on luggage, they checked video footage and saw Zhang, during flights from China and Southeast Asia to Taiwan, opening the overhead compartment on the pretense of taking out his things, but instead opening other people’s luggage to steal their belongings.
Bureau officials searched Zhang after a flight in April and found 16 different foreign currencies and valuable items belonging to other passengers.
Zhang was charged with aggravated theft by Taoyuan prosecutors.
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