Day: December 29, 2021

A new specialized agency under the defense ministry in charge of reservists’ mobilization will be launched Thursday as part of Taiwan’s ongoing efforts to improve the combat readiness of the country’s reserve forces.

The Thursday ceremony to launch the All-out Defense Mobilization Agency (???????) will be presided over by President Tsai Ing-wen (???), according to the Ministry of National Defense (MND).

The agency is an upgrade of the existing All-out Defense Mobilization Office under the MND headquarters. The newly established agency will also see an increase in its staff members from 30 to 150.

The structural change is part of military reforms designed to make Taiwan’s reserve forces a more reliable backup for regular soldiers in defending the nation, according to the MND.

Aside from being responsible for mobilization during wartime, the agency will also be tasked with cross-ministries coordination to boost the capabilities of national reservists in the event of war and in post-disaster relief during peacetime.

Meanwhile, a military source said that Army Lieutenant General Pai Chieh-lung (???), currently in charge of the MND’s Department of Resource Planning, will be the first head of the agency.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

A multi-purpose Jewish community center opened Wednesday in Taipei with the aim of serving as a “new hub” for Jewish culture in Taiwan while fostering exchanges between Taiwan nationals and Jews, according to the Jewish Taiwan Cultural Association (JTCA).

“We wanted to share Jewish culture, traditions, education and religion” in Taiwan and “offer a space to call home for Jewish people in Taiwan,” Taipei-based businessman Jeffrey D. Schwartz said of his motives for founding the JTCA and building a community center dedicated to Jewish people and culture during the inaugural ceremony.

“This goes beyond cultivating Jewish culture in Taiwan,” said Schwartz, who began working on the initiative to build the center in 2018 with his Taiwanese singer wife Na Tang (??). “Our goal was to integrate the strengths of Taiwanese people and the fortes of Jewish people.”

“We also want all Jewish people around the world to see the value and beauty of our Isle Formosa and to facilitate opportunities for global exchanges for Taiwan.”

The 22,500-square-foot (2,090 square meters) Jeffrey D. Schwartz Jewish Community Center, named after the founder and CEO of Four Star Group, Inc., houses a synagogue, a mikveh (ritual bath), an authentic kosher restaurant, banquet rooms, a kindergarten and a museum of Jewish art and antiquities, according to the JTCA website.

“The community center is located at the center of Taipei City, providing citizens with an opportunity to access and understand the Jewish culture with ease,” Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (???) remarked at the ceremony.

Vice President Lai Ching-te (???) echoed Ko’s views, saying the center would help “build a bridge for communication and interaction between Taiwanese and Jewish culture.”

It will also promote friendship between the people of Taiwan and the Jewish community, Lai said, adding that both Taiwanese and Jews cherish the values of human rights and freedom.

Meanwhile, Israeli Representative to Taiwan Omer Caspi said the community center is “a significant and exciting milestone in the development of Jewish life in Taiwan.”

It symbolizes the prosperity and growth of the Jewish community that have existed on the island for decades, said Caspi, who heads the Israel Economic and Cultural Office in Taipei.

The office represents Israel’s interests in Taiwan in the absence of diplomatic ties between the two countries.

While Jews across the world have been persecuted for centuries, they have always been welcomed in Taiwan, Caspi said.

He added that he hoped the community center would become a place open to everyone interested in learning about the rich Jewish heritage and history while spurring dialogue and understanding among Jews and Taiwanese.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

Transportation Minister Wang Kwo-tsai (???) said Wednesday that the ministry plans to propose revisions to existing laws to introduce stiffer penalties for drunk driving, in the wake of several recent cases.

The proposals will include confiscating the vehicles of first-time offenders if they cause an accident resulting in death or serious injury while driving under the influence, Wang said. Such a penalty currently only applies to repeat offenders.

Wang said the ministry is also mulling expanding the definition of “repeat offender” by extending the period covered by a drunk driving record from five years to 10.

Although related laws were most recently amended in May 2019 to increase punishments, Wang said the ministry is looking to introduce penalties that will be severe enough to curb drunk driving.

Currently, the maximum punishment for drunk driving is a two-year jail sentence and in the event of a fatality 3-10 years.

According to ministry data, there were 909 alcohol-related road deaths in 2011, 399 in 2016 and 289 in 2020.

In addition, the punishment of passengers in vehicles when the driver is found to be drunk will also be tougher. Currently, passengers are fined NT$600-NT$3,000 (US$22-US$108), but Wang said the ministry is looking to raise it to NT$3,000-NT$15,000.

Drunk driving has attracted much public attention recently, following a spate of incidents, including one related to a repeat offender who drove into a family on a zebra crossing, killing the mother and seriously injuring the husband and two children on Dec. 26.

On Wednesday, lawmakers from the Taiwan People’s Party urged the government to implement more effective measures to reduce drunk driving, including making it compulsory for all new cars to have ignition interlock devices.

The current law requires only repeat offenders to install such devices on their vehicles, but the policy does not seem to be working, the lawmakers said at a press conference. Drivers can easily get around the rule by having someone else unlock the device or simply driving a different car, the legislators noted.

During a legislative session, Kuomintang lawmakers also suggested alternatives to curb driving under the influence, such as the adoption of caning, or public disclosure of the offenders’ personal information.

In response, Deputy Minister of Justice Chang Tou-hui (???) said the ministry will look into the proposals made by the lawmakers to determine their practicality.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

Former President Chen Shui-bian’s (???) son-in-law Chao Chien-ming (???) was sentenced to 46 months for perjury and insider trading by the High Court on Wednesday.

The jail term is the combination of a three-month sentence for perjury and a 44-month sentence for insider trading of which Chao was found guilty in August 2011 and October 2021, respectively. An interlocutory appeal can be filed to challenge the combined sentence.

Chao started his jail sentence in October.

The perjury was a result of Chao cooperating with former first lady Wu Shu-jen (???), who was found guilty of using fraudulent receipts to obtain reimbursement for spending from the state affairs fund in 2006.

The ruling about insider-trading came after a guilty verdict in a case mired in years of litigation related to the trading of shares in real-estate developer Taiwan Land Development Corp. (TLDC) in 2005. The case later became a major political scandal in Taiwan.

In 2005, Chao’s father decided to buy TLDC shares after then-TLDC Chairman Su Te-chien (???) leaked confidential information regarding the approval of a syndicated loan for the company to the Chaos and others at a dinner in a Japanese restaurant in Taipei that year.

Chao’s father bought TLDC shares a few days after the meeting before news of the loan’s approval surfaced and sent the shares significantly higher.

According to the High Court, Chao’s father made illegal gains of NT$35.17 million (US$1.26 million) because of the insider information.

Chao did not buy any shares and did not make any illegal gains, but the court found him guilty of sharing information and coordinating insider trading activity with his father and others involved in the scheme.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

Taiwan’s government and its largest opposition party have condemned China after police raided the Hong Kong offices of pro-democracy media outlet Stand News and arrested six for “conspiracy to publish seditious publications.”

The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC), the government agency in charge of cross-strait affairs, said the raid and arrests were just the latest measures the Chinese Communist regime had taken to suppress Hong Kong’s press freedom, despite stipulations in the city’s Basic Law that guarantee residents of the special administrative region freedom of speech, press, and publication.

It was also further proof of the hypocrisy of the “one country, two systems” administrative formula China promised to Hong Kong, the MAC said in a press release.

Taiwan’s government condemned all forms of misconduct in suppressing human rights and freedom and called on all parties involved to stop serving as accomplices of Beijing.

The ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said the arrests of six current and former senior staff at Stand News — including Cantopop star and pro-democracy activist Denise Ho (???) — once again showed the world that the Chinese Communist regime had broken its promise to preserve the many freedoms Hong Kong enjoys that are not found in China’s other cities.

The DPP comments were a reference to the Sino-British Joint Declaration, a treaty signed by China’s government together with the British government prior to the handover of Hong Kong in 1997, in which China agreed to allow the region considerable political autonomy for fifty years under a framework known as “one country, two systems.”

In recent years, however, Beijing — which stated in 2014 that it considers the agreement to no longer be in force — has cracked down on Hong Kong’s freedoms, violently suppressing mass protests in the city before imposing a national security law in 2020 that gave it broad powers to punish critics and silence dissenters in Hong Kong.

According to the DPP, Hong Kong authorities have repeatedly suppressed press freedom in the special administrative region since the implementation of the national security law.

Hong Kong’s government also revamped its electoral system to ensure only pro-Beijing “patriots” will be allowed to stand for election in a move to further silence the city’s democratic voice, the DPP said in a press release.

The DPP said it would continue to stand with Hong Kong in supporting its people’s fight for democracy and freedom while urging the international community to continue to closely monitor the latest developments in the city.

Echoing this sentiment, the main opposition Kuomintang (KMT) also voiced its concerns over the arrests and the raid, urging the authorities in China to respect the younger generation’s view on democratic values and freedom of expression in Hong Kong.

Meanwhile, the global press freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) called for the release of all the arrested journalists.

“Exactly six months after the dismantling of the Next Digital group and its flagship newspaper Apple Daily, Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam once again shows her determination to terminate press freedom in the territory by eliminating Stand News in a similar fashion,” said Cédric Alviani, RSF East Asia bureau head.

He called for the release of all journalists and urged democracies “to act in line with their own values and obligations and defend what’s left of the free press in Hong Kong before China’s model of information control claims another victim”.

Early Wednesday, more than 200 police officers raided the office of pro-democracy news outlet Stand News, which has been the most-prominent remaining pro-democracy publication in Hong Kong after a national security probe earlier this year led to the closure of jailed tycoon Jimmy Lai’s (???) Apple Daily tabloid.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

Tri-Service General Hospital’s superintendent Wang Chih-hung (???) and 24 other military physicians have been sentenced to between two months and a year in prison, in what has been dubbed the medical world’s biggest ever tax evasion case.

The sentences handed down by the High Court can be commuted to a fine and are subject to appeal.

The military physicians were part of a larger group of 27 indicted on charges of tax evasion in 2016. The group was initially found not guilty by the Taipei District Court.

However, after prosecutors appealed the lower court’s decision, the High Court overturned the ruling on Wednesday and found 25 of the defendants guilty of using charitable foundations as a vehicle for tax evasion.

In 2016, the Taiwan Taipei District Prosecutors Office started investigating allegations that former National Defense Medical Center chief and Academia Sinica fellow Chai Chok-yung (???) had used various charitable foundations to accept donations from over 200 medical physicians between 2005 and 2009 and then used the foundation to return 95 percent of the donations to the donors in the name of subsidizing research fees.

Chai and 224 others avoided prosecution by admitting to the allegations and agreeing to pay a fine.

However, Wang, who was chief of the Army Logistics Command’s medical office when the investigation began, and 26 military physicians were indicted by the Taipei District Prosecutors Office after contesting the charges.

The Taiwan Taipei District Court in June 2018 found the 27 defendants not guilty, reasoning that they had received foundation subsidies not equal to 95 percent of their donations for the year and that the ratio of donations to subsidies varied, with some defendants making donations larger than their grants.

Prosecutors appealed the decision to the High Court, and after considering statements from the foundation’s officials and accountants as well as reviewing bank transaction details, it was found that the foundation allowed donors to apply for research, study, or social welfare grants within 95 percent of their donated amounts.

The second trial found that the model of the foundations allowed the donors to get back a large amount of money they donated and benefit from tax deductions.

In addition, only 5 percent of the donation is actually obtained by the foundation and it has no substantial benefit to the foundation and does not meet the purpose of the donation, the trial found.

The collegial panel found that the model did not conform to the true nature of donations, subsidies, and other behaviors, saying that the donations were a means of disguising tax evasion.

The latest trial pointed out that the 25 defendants’ acts of tax evasion were in different years and based on separate intentions, and hence should be punished separately.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

Opposition party leaders on Wednesday joined advocacy groups to voice their support for enshrining the protection of animals in the Constitution by pushing for a constitutional amendment, amid a lack of progress at the Legislature.

The Kuomintang (KMT) supports the inclusion of animal protection in the Constitution, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (???) said at the opening of a conference held in Taipei by the Animal Protection Legislation Movement Alliance (APLMA), a coalition consisting of eight animal rights groups.

The KMT has adopted the notion of protecting animals and their rights in its party charter, Chu said, adding that the issue of animal protection transcended party lines and would require the efforts of all members of society.

Meanwhile, Chen Jiau-hua (???), chairwoman of the New Power Party (NPP), said the legislation was essential for improving animal protection in Taiwan.

She also called for President Tsai Ing-wen (???) and the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to commit to promoting the inclusion of animal protection in the Constitution.

Previously, KMT Legislator Cheng Li-wun (???) and Taiwan People’s Partyn (TPP) Legislator Tsai Pi-ru (???) both said they had introduced their respective versions of the constitutional amendment bill to the Legislature.

Meanwhile, several lawmakers from the DPP and TPP have also expressed support for the legislation.

However, Deputy Secretary-General to the President Lee Chun-yi (???) of the DPP, who also attended the opening, pointed out that there had been little progress concerning the Constitutional Amendment Committee at the Legislature.

The ad-hoc committee was formed in 2020 to push for several constitutional amendments that would see the lowering of the voting age, and the abolition of the Examination Yuan and Control Yuan, among other issues.

The conveners of the 39-member committee held their first meeting since May on Dec. 23 to discuss the committee’s agenda, but no consensus was reached.

According to the APLMA, animal rights groups have been campaigning since 2020 for a constitutional amendment that would enshrine the protection and welfare of all animals.

The Animal Protection Act, which has been in effect for over two decades, has proven to be insufficient in protecting animals and preventing cruelty cases, APLMA told CNA, mentioning in particular that the effectiveness of the act was often undermined by other regulations.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel