Taiwan condicts ex-presidential espionage for China

A Taiwan court sentenced a former presidential spying assistant for China and three others who were also employed by the Progressive Democratic Party (DPP) in power.

One of the men worked in the office of the Minister of Foreign Affairs at the time, Joseph Wu, who is now the head of national security.

The court has given men to prison conditions from four to 10 years for disclosing state secrets. The decision said that espionage had been made “over a very long period” and involved sharing “significant diplomatic information”.

Beijing claims Taiwan, a democratically governed like his, and the two have been spied on for decades. But Taipei says that Chinese espionage has intensified in recent years.

Of the four men convicted Thursday, Huang Chu-Jung, former assistant of a Taipei advisor, received the longest prison time: 10 years. Prosecutors initially asked for sentences up to 18 years.

All four were charged in June, a month after being expelled from the DPP.

According to the court, Huang had asked a staff member of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to obtain information from WU, then Minister of Foreign Affairs. He then wrote reports using this information and sent him to the intelligence of the Chinese Communist Party using encrypted software.

The staff of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ho Jen-Chieh, was sentenced to eight years and two months in prison.

Huang was also accused of working with another former DPP staff, Chiu Shih-Yuan to collect more information. The court learned that Chiu had obtained information from Wu Shangyu, who was assistant to Lai Ching-Te, the current president.

Wu was assistant to Lai when he was vice-president, then again for a short time after his being became president in 2024. Wu was accused of having transmitted details on Lai’s routes during his trips.

Huang received nearly $ 5 million NT ($ 163,172; £ 122,203) from the Chinese government, the court said, while Chiu was paid for more than $ 2 million.

“The information on which they spied on, collected, disclosed and delivered involved significant diplomatic information … which aggravated the difficult diplomatic situation of our country,” the court said on Thursday.

It is only the last in a series of spy convictions while Taiwan increases efforts to find alleged Chinese spies on his soil.

In 2024, the Taiwan National Security Office said 64 people had been prosecuted for espionage for China. This is a marked increase compared to previous years – between 2013 and 2019, 44 spy cases were recorded by the Taiwan Ministry of Justice.

Espionage claims have been leveled against several high -ranking Taiwan officials in recent years, including a former air force colonel who, in 2023, was imprisoned for 20 years for having led a military espionage ring for China.

Taiwan’s relationship with China has become the subject of a deeply polarizing debate. On the one hand, the DPP of Lai which is more frank against China and is considered a pro-independence independence, and on the other is the Kuomintang Party (KMT), which has always been more friendly with China, and has encouraged more dialogue.

The DPP accuses the KMT of being used by Beijing to pedal its influence – while the criticisms of the ruling party and of the President Lai say that it rages the opposition under the guise of targeting the sympathizers “pro -china”.

It happened when China reiterates its claims on Taiwan, testing its naval and air defenses with regular incursions.

President Lai has often denounced against China as a danger to Taiwan, calling it a “foreign hostile force”.

Beijing, in turn, criticized him several times, calling him “destructive of cross peace”.