Taiwan Denies Role in Spy Case Involving U.S. Navy Officer

By AUSTIN RAMZYAPRIL

Taiwan’s military denied any involvement on Tuesday in the case of a United States naval officer under investigation on suspicion of providing secret information to Taiwan or China.

The Navy is weighing charges of espionage against the officer, a naturalized American citizen born in Taiwan. Investigators believe that the officer, Lt. Cmdr. Edward C. Lin, 39, may have given secret information to a Chinese girlfriend. He is also accused of visiting a prostitute, infidelity, not disclosing foreign travel and lying to investigators.

Maj. Gen. David Lo, a spokesman for Taiwan’s Ministry of Defense, said that American investigators had not contacted Taiwan so he was unfamiliar with the details of the case. But in a news conference on Tuesday, he denied that Taiwan would have pursued such spying.

“We have absolutely never used or exploited current or former U.S. military personnel to help with any intelligence gathering,” General Lo said.

China’s Defense Ministry did not immediately comment on the case.

Commander Lin moved to the United States at age 14, and the Navy has praised him as an immigrant success story. He attended Officer Candidate School and the United States War College and served as a flight officer, at the Pentagon and at the Special Projects Patrol Squadron 2 in Hawaii.

He is now in detention at the Navy Consolidated Brig in Chesapeake, Va., and awaiting a decision on whether he will face a full court-martial, United States officials said. The Navy has evidence that Commander Lin traveled to Taiwan without getting permission first, as is required, said a United States official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly. Commander Lin also made plans to travel to China, he said, and had not informed the Navy.

Commander Lin’s work on Navy spy planes would have been of particular interest to foreign militaries. But while China, a rival and regular target of United States intelligence gathering, would have clear reasons for pursuing such information, Taiwan’s interests are less obvious.

Taiwan faces a long-term military threat from China, which considers the island part of its territory that must eventually be united. The United States is Taiwan’s biggest ally and a key provider of weaponry to resist China.

Under the Taiwan Relations Act, such armaments must be defensive in nature. That means Taiwan is limited in what it can receive from the United States, which could be a motive for espionage, said Wu Shang-su, a research fellow at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore who studies the Chinese military and security issues in Asia.

“Previously, they have had difficulty accessing technology because the U.S. government has not wanted to provide everything Taiwan requests,” Mr. Wu said.

Still, gaining access to military technology is “not a high priority for them,” he added.

Espionage efforts by China could also be channeled through Taiwan, he said. Taiwan’s military is the focus of intense Chinese spying efforts, and there have been several high-profile cases of officers providing information to China.

“Another possibility is that China has successfully penetrated Taiwan, and they use Taiwan as a cover,” Mr. Wu said.

In recent decades, the United States has had very few cases that hinted of intelligence activities by Taiwan. In 1991, Douglas S. Tsou, a former translator for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, was convicted of disclosing classified information when he revealed the name of a Chinese spy to the authorities in Taiwan, exposing an informant. “I don’t like Communists,” he told a Houston court in explaining his actions.

Donald W. Keyser, a former senior State Department official, was sentenced to one year in prison in 2007 for concealing a personal relationship with an intelligence agent from Taiwan and keeping classified documents at his home. Mr. Keyser denied passing classified information to Taiwan and said he was working to further American interests by forging a channel of communication to Taiwan intelligence officers.

被捕美軍官涉台諜？ 我國防部否認

在台灣出生的美國現役海軍少校愛德華．林（Edward Lin）被指控涉嫌從事間諜活動，美國媒體「野獸日報」（Daily Beast）十一日報導，林姓軍官二○一一年曾接受台灣政府邀請訪台，並引述美國官員的說法表示，林姓軍官洩密的對象不是先前傳出的中國大陸，而是台灣。

美國海軍學會新聞網（USNI News）十一日披露林姓軍官的中文名字拼音為Chieh-Liang（音譯介良）。另據華爾街日報報導，美國官員說，林除了疑似提供情報給台灣政府外，也曾計畫去大陸會見大陸軍官，但不清楚是否與北京當局分享情報，他曾意圖這樣做。紐約時報報導，林的「控告記錄」（charge sheet）只提到他涉嫌為台灣從事間諜活動，並「可能」也為大陸當間諜，但仍在調查。報導並引述美國官員的話說，調查人員認為林提供情報給一名大陸女友。

針對野獸日報的報導，美國海軍部尚未回覆本報記者的詢問。野獸日報引述美國國防官員的話說，現年三十九歲的林姓軍官被控提供軍事機密給出生國，可能用來交換性招待；林姓軍官在軍用偵察機工作，讓他有管道接觸美國用來偵查敵軍的敏感儀器。官員說，林先前請假並謊報目的地，因此遭到懷疑。

海軍官員懷疑，林在一趟個人旅行中與一名台灣人士碰面，並提供情資給這名人士；海軍官員之後詢問林的同僚，多數人都說林的舉止很可疑。此外，林姓軍官經常到世界各地旅遊，毫不隱藏他對大陸的不屑，而根據他的個人臉書，他從二○○八年開始，曾到杜拜、大陸、台灣、約旦和英國等地旅遊。

報導指出，林姓軍官二○一一年接受台灣政府贊助訪問台灣，團員之一的維利茲（Daniel Velez）受訪表示，這一團是台灣政府安排的文化之旅，期間並拜會不同單位，為期六天。

林的案子八日進行預審，法官將決定是否交付軍事法庭審判。

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/13/world/asia/taiwan-us-navy-spy-investigation.html

2016-04-12．聯合報．A4．要聞．編譯田思怡、記者程嘉文