TPP’s Chou Hsiao-yun released on bail after questioning
By Wang Ting-chuan and Jonathan Chin / Staff reporter, with staff writer
The New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday released Taoyuan city councilor candidate Chou Hsiao-yun (周曉芸) of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) on bail, a day after questioning her on suspicion of involvement in Chinese election interference.
Chou was released on a NT$500,000 (US$15,214) bail and barred from traveling outside Taiwan in connection with an investigation into alleged breaches of the Anti-Infiltration Act (反滲透法), Personal Data Protection Act (個人資料保護法) and Business Entity Accounting Act (商業會計法), among other laws, the office said in a statement.
She was also placed under monitoring, it said.
Taoyuan city councilor candidate Chou Hsiao-yun of the Taiwan People’s Party is pictured in an undated photograph.
Photo: Taipei Times
Prosecutors on Monday interviewed 14 people, including Chou, and searched 18 locations connected to Chou in a joint operation with the Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau’s New Taipei City branch, the Information and Communication Security Task Force and New Taipei City police, the office said.
Three of the people questioned were released on NT$300,000 bail each and barred from traveling outside the country, while three were released on bails ranging from NT$30,000 to NT$1 million, four were released as suspects and three were released as witnesses, it said.
Chou, a former staffer and protege of TPP Chairman Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌), first ran for Kinmen County Council in 2022. She lost after garnering just 1,157 votes.
Last year, Chou resigned from her posts in the party’s Kinmen chapter to run for New Taipei City Council and before becoming the deputy head of the organization development department at the TPP headquarters and the person in charge at one of Huang’s local offices.
She would lost the party nomination for New Taipei City councilor to Chen Yen-ting (陳彥廷), but was drafted to run as one of the party’s candidates for Taoyuan City Council.
The move elicited backlash among the TPP’s local members, who decried it as evidence of favoritism, with city councilor hopeful Kao Hua-hung (高華宏) quitting the party in protest.
“Instead of competition, we got humiliation,” Kao said at the time.
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