Two retired Taiwanese officers have been accused of creating a spying network for China and violating the national security law on Friday.
According to the Taipei District Prosecutors Office, the two accused have been Identified with their family names. Chien is a retired major general and Wei is a retired lieutenant colonel.
The court filings state that the two officers had helped a citizen of Hong Kong, surnamed Tse, who had links in the Central Military Commission (CMC) of China.
Tse was working with an organization in the Guangdong province of southeast China known to be associated with the CMC. He came to Taiwan with an aim of connecting with officers in the military. For this, the Hong Konger posed as a businessman and attempted to manipulate a few retired officials with free meals and trips.
Chein and Wei fell into the trap, as per the statement because they tried to persuade the former deputy defense minister Chang Che-ping to join them but their efforts were in vain.
As per the statement, both the retired officers have 'intentionally' jeopardized the national security of Taiwan and contributed towards 'developing a network' for Beijing's military.
The investigation of this case has continued since July last year when the involvement of the officers was initially discovered.
Considered as a high-level case, as per a defense ministry spokesperson of Taiwan, the incident was one among many conducted by the Chinese Communist Party to get to the national secrets of Taiwan by associating with its high ranking generals.
Chang was also under investigation for the same in July 2021, after an in-depth examination of the circumstance he was named a witness and not a defendant. He was recently appointed as a military strategy advisor to President Tsai Ing-wen.
This is not the first such an espionage was discovered in Taiwan with links to China. Both countries have spied on the other ever since the Chinese civil war ended in 1949, according to CNA.
With the current President Tsai's election in 2016, China appears to have jacked up its efforts in claiming sovereignty over the island country.
In the past month, Beijing has adopted a more aggressive stance as it openly announced to make Taiwan a Chinese territory soon, simultaneously indicating that they will use force if required.
