Premier vows to get to bottom of leaks over missile blunder
ROC Central News Agency
2016/07/02 16:48:57
Taipei, July 2 (CNA) In an emergency meeting called Saturday, Premier Lin Chuan (林全) gave a directive that related government agencies must get to the bottom of military leaks related to a missile blunder a day earlier that caused the death of a Taiwanese fisherman.
Lin called the meeting to manage the fallout from the unprecedented incident. The three-hour meeting was attended by officials from related agencies.
During the meeting, Lin said that the military leaks have posed a serious threat to Taiwan's national security, demanding that the Ministry of National Defense review its existing measures to protect confidential information and the task force put together by the Ministry of Justice conduct a thorough investigation into the leaks, according to Cabinet spokesman Tung Chen-yuan (童振源).
Tung did not provide further details on the leaks.
But separately, Defense Minister Feng Shih-kuan (馮世寬) said earlier in the day in Kaohsiung that his ministry will look into possible military leaks, when asked about the actions of Tsai Cheng-yuan (蔡正元), executive director of the Kuomintang's Policy Committee, who revealed the missile blunder in a Facebook post shortly after the missile was fired by mistake.
Tsai, whose "Missile Crisis!" post on his Facebook page released at 8:54 a.m. a day earlier caught the media's attention, said it is laughable to call his breaking of the news a leak of state secrets.
"What kind of secret was it when between 500 and 600 people were on hand to watch what was happening?" Tsai said.
On Friday, the Ministry of Justice formed a task force comprised of several prosecutors to look into the incident.
Lin said the task force should find out every detail behind the incident to clarity if it involved lapses in military discipline, and that the defense ministry should cooperate with the prosecutors.
"Wasn't the Kaohsiung District Prosecutors Office already investigating this? Did Lin Chuan not know this?" Tsai said.
His post was simple: "Missile Crisis! At 8:20 a.m. this morning, a Chinchiang corvette was said to have misfired a Hsiung Feng III missile with a range of 300 km."
Meanwhile, the premier demanded the defense ministry carry out a thorough review on its operating procedures, personnel training and discipline, as well as identify all the officers who should be held accountable.
He also asked the ministry to negotiate on the matter of state compensation with the family of the captain of the Taiwanese fishing boat, who was killed in the incident, as soon as possible.
Feng traveled to Kaohsiung, southern Taiwan, to offer the apology in person to the family of the dead captain, Huang Wen-chung (黃文忠), at their home. He promised to help them obtain state compensation and repair the damaged fishing boat, which has been towed back to Kaohsiung.
The locally developed Hsiung Feng III supersonic anti-ship missile was accidentally launched from one of the Navy's 500-ton Chinchiang-class corvettes at Zuoying Military Harbor in Kaohsiung during a drill at 8:15 a.m. on Friday and hit the fishing boat about two minutes later, according to the Navy.
The Defense Ministry confirmed that the missile ripped through the "Hsiang Li Sheng" (翔利昇) fishing boat, causing the death of the captain and injuring the three other crew members on the boat.
(By Tang Pei-chun, Wang Shwu-fen, Elaine Hou and S.C. Chang)
ENDITEM/ke/ke
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