Documents in investigation of ex-president declassified in Taiwan

Aug 6, 2008, 12:02 GMT

Taipei - Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou on Wednesday declassified documents to facilitate prosecutors' investigation into embezzlement allegations against his predecessor Chen Shui-bian, officials said.

'After carefully reviewing all those documents, we have found that they are nothing confidential at all and would in no way endanger the national interests if they are exposed,' Chan Chun-po, presidential secretary general, said at a news conference.

None of the documents involved military, diplomatic or national secrets, making it unreasonable for them to be made top secret as Chen had sought, Ma spokesman Wang Yu-chi said.

The former president is accused of being involved in a 14.8-million-Taiwan-dollar (483,000-US-dollar) embezzlement case in which, his wife, Wu Shu-chen, has already been charged.

Wu was indicted in November 2006 and questioned by a court a month later over allegations she used receipts provided by others to make spending claims of up to 14.8 million Taiwan dollars from 2000 to 2006. Prosecutors said they had enough evidence to charge Chen with the same crime but would wait until he left office because of his presidential immunity.

Chen, whose term ended in May, has tried to stop the court's proceeding against his wife by declaring the receipts and other documents gathered as evidence by prosecutors were secret, saying under the constitution, the judicial authorities had no power to access those documents and hence could not use them as evidence.

Chen's office criticized the declassification Wednesday, saying it was 'not only a violation of law but also a serious violation of the constitution, which empowers a president to make certain information top secret permanently.'

'Ma should be condemned,' the office said in a statement.