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SIX LAWYERS CONTRACTED TO AID DETAINED TAIWAN BUSINESSMEN IN MAINLAND

2004-01-20 18:07:55

    Taipei, Jan. 20 (CNA) Six lawyers were contracted by the quasi-official Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) Tuesday to offer help to the seven Taiwan businessmen who are being detained in mainland China over espionage charges.

    At a news conference, the cross-Taiwan Strait intermediary body announced the lawyers who would be going to help the seven Taiwan businessmen detained in separate mainland Chinese cities.

    The lawyers, led by Fuldien Li from Li & Partners, will accompany Taiwan family members of the seven detainees to the mainland, where the lawyers will contact their mainland counterparts to work out lawsuit strategies and relevant measures conducive to the safe return of the detainees to Taiwan.

    Another member of the group, Wellington Koo from Formosa Transnational Attorneys at Law, is known for his experience in assisting Taiwan businessman Kou Chien-ming in a similar espionage trial on the mainland several years ago.

    Since Taiwan lawyers are not allowed to practice in mainland China, they will not be able to represent the detainees at any trials on the mainland.

    The Taiwan lawyers and the detainees' families are scheduled to depart for the mainland at the beginning of February, said an SEF official at the news conference.

    SEF's Beijing counterpart, the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS), sent a letter to the SEF Jan. 13, saying that seven "Taiwan residents" were arrested between Dec. 4 and Dec. 15 last year in mainland China on suspicions of spying.

    The ARATS letter said that Taiwan citizens Fu Hung-chang, Lin Chieh-shan, Lee Hsiao-lien, Wang Chang-yung, Chang Keng-huan and Chang Yu-jen were apprehended last Dec. 15 in Guangdong, Fujian, Anhui and Hainan provinces, respectively, on suspicion of gathering intelligence for Taiwan's military authorities.

    A seventh Taiwan citizen, Tung Tai-ping, as nabbed last Dec. 4 while allegedly collecting intelligence at the Huangpu Shipbuilding Co. in Guangzhou, it added.

    The ARATS claimed that all seven men were members of "cells" dispatched by Taiwan's Military Intelligence Bureau. The men are, currently being detained for questioning and are in good health, the organization said.

(By Deborah Kuo)

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