The 'black hole' of Taiwan
criminals By Ting-I Tsai
TAIPEI - When the driver of an armored
security van, identified as Lee Han-yang, 45,
allegedly drugged his colleague and fled Taiwan to
the mainland city of Kunming with NT$56 million
(US$1.72 million) in early January, it seemed as
if he had pulled off a perfect heist.
However, at mid-month mainland Chinese
authorities arrested him and his alleged
accomplice and younger brother, Lee Chin-sang. And
Taiwan's National Police Agency Director General
Hou Yu-ih told reporters that the mainland
authorities planned to extradite
Lee
back to Taiwan to stand trial.
This was an
unusual example of cross-strait cooperation in
criminal investigations. More often, a Taiwanese
criminal who manages to get to China disappears
into the vast mainland, as if he had been sucked
into a black hole.
Because of the tense
political relationship across the Taiwan Strait,
mainland China has developed into a back yard of
Taiwanese criminals and fugitives in the past
decades. Occasionally, mainland authorities
cooperate with their Taiwan counterparts, but more
often they do not.
Because of this
ambivalent attitude, it is estimated that more
than 500 wanted Taiwanese fugitives or suspects
are comfortably residing in mainland China. So
far, the mainland has gained the reputation as
Taiwanese criminals' "Bermuda Triangle", for the
section of the Atlantic where ships are lost never
to return.
Authorities arrested Lee
Han-yang in southeastern China's Yunnan province
and agreed to send him back to Taiwan, but they
took a different tack with Wang You-theng, who is
suspected of embezzling billions of New Taiwan
dollars from his Rebar Asia Pacific Group. The
authorities merely suggested that he return to
face the music.
Chinese President Hu
Jintao promised to work with Taiwan over the issue
of extraditing criminals in his summit with the
former chairman of Taiwan's opposition Kuomintang,
Lien Chan, in April 2005. It remains to be seen
how much this promise has been turned into regular
cooperation between the mainland's and the
island's criminal-investigation departments.
"My students have complained that whenever
suspects and funds [under investigation] flee to
China, the case is closed," said Hsieh Li-kung,
professor at the border police department of
Taiwan's Central Police University.
Taiwan's Criminal Investigation Bureau
(CIB) has pinpointed at least 500 Taiwanese
fugitives currently residing in the mainland,
compared with 192 by the end of 2001. The current
number would be higher if it included those CIB
has failed to locate. Since the early 1990s, China
has only extradited 217 Taiwanese fugitives,
mainly smugglers who have committed crimes in its
own territory.
Taipei and Beijing signed
the Kinmen Agreement (named after the
Taiwan-occupied offshore island where it was
inked) in September 1990. Under it, both sides are
obligated to repatriate criminals, wanted suspects
and those who illegally enter the other side's
territory. The agreement is now considered too
vague and in tatters.
Agreement or no
agreement, starting from mid-1990s, Taiwanese
economic criminals have crossed the Taiwan Strait
to escape justice, leaving more than NT$200
billion of debts behind in Taiwan. The majority of
these fugitives have skillfully laundered their
embezzled money in the mainland by making
significant investments and even charitable
contributions in the past decades. For this reason
mainland authorities have been reluctant to arrest
them.
Wang You-theng of the Rebar Asia
Pacific Group donated a school in his birthplace
in Hunan province and was planning to purchase
buildings in Shanghai for his group before he fled
Taiwan. Chen Yu-hao, former chairman of the Tuntex
Group, suspected of embezzling NT$880 million from
his group and leaving behind NT$60 million in
debts in Taiwan, is now one of mainland China's
biggest taxpayers and a Chinese passport holder.
Wang Yu-yuan, former mayor of Kaohsiung
and chairman of Chungching Bank, fled to the
mainland after he was sentenced to seven years and
four months for embezzling more than NT$20 billion
from the bank. Aside from these, suspects in 10
more cases economic crimes have safely taken
refuge in the mainland, as Beijing claims that the
Taiwanese suspects have not violated any laws in
China.
Intending to resolve the worsening
problem, the two sides' criminal-investigation
authorities pragmatically developed some back-door
channels, including a semi-official annual
conference on a joint crackdown on crime in
mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau.
Through the back door, several of Taiwan's most
wanted fugitives have been repatriated, but this
is still no guarantee of future cooperation.
"We need an institutionalized mechanism
for cooperation," said Liu Te-hsun, vice chairman
of Taiwan's cabinet-level Mainland Affairs
Council, adding that the MAC would be flexible on
any format of negotiation as long as an agreement
could be reached.
According to the CIB,
cross-strait cooperation among criminals has
become increasingly sophisticated in recent years.
For instance, Taiwanese gangsters flee to China
and assist their mainland counterparts to upgrade
their criminal skills.
Phone swindles and
human smuggling, according to CIB, are the most
popular cases requiring cross-strait crime
cooperation since these are usually initiated by
the other side, creating the legal problem
regarding the jurisdiction of investigation and
enormous difficulties for investigation in
practice.
To crack down effectively on
cross-strait crimes, the CIB believes it is
necessary for both sides to establish liaison
offices in Beijing and Taipei to exchange
intelligence. If Beijing is still reluctant, Kao
Cheng-sheng of the CIB added, "At least we could
sit down and review the decade-old Kinmen
agreement."
Refuting Taipei's accusation
of Beijing's insincerity on solving crimes, a
spokesman for the mainland's Ministry of Public
Security, Wu Heping, said China would make every
effort to arrest and send back criminal suspects
wanted by Taiwan who have fled to the mainland,
starting with heist suspect Lee Han-yang. Wu
failed to elaborate on the details of further
cooperation.
Criminology professor Hsieh
said Beijing might only be willing to cooperate
with crimes that could be considered a problem for
the mainland itself, such as drugs,
money-laundering, phone swindles, and corruption.
He suggested that both sides should start from
common issues and bypass political differences.
"Crime is crime; what does it have to do
with politics?" Hsieh said.
Ting-I
Tsai is a freelance journalist based in
Taipei.
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