Island's ex-premier pleads not guilty
Former Taiwanese premier Yu Shyi-kun yesterday pleaded not guilty to embezzling NT$2.4 million (HK$577,000) in special government allowances during his times as the presidential secretary-general and premier.
'I told the court I had done nothing wrong because what I did was exactly in line with the existing claim practice by all other government leaders,' Mr Yu said after the first court hearing.
Prosecutors indicted the 59-year-old Mr Yu in September on charges of using receipts provided by others to make spending claims from the special government allowances allocated to him for public functions when he was presidential secretary general and premier between 2000 and 2005.
He said that in the past 20 years, he had remained honest and clean.
Mr Yu, a former chairman of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, was among four DPP heavyweights sued by the opposition Kuomintang for embezzlement of the special allowances. Prosecutors, however, charged only Mr Yu and Vice-President Annette Lu Hsiu-lien with corruption.
The special allowance controversy is a result of a flawed, decades-old system which allots special monthly expenses for senior government officials as a kind of subsidy.
It started when the DPP sued opposition Kuomintang presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou for embezzlement during his time as Taipei mayor.
The courts found Mr Ma not guilty of corruption.
