Ma Chih-wei appearing in court [Captured from Taiwan's Central News Agency]

A former employee of the Taiwan People's Party (TPP) has been sentenced to two years and eight months in prison for running for a legislative seat with the backing of Chinese funds.

According to Taiwanese media reports such as the Liberty Times on the 24th, the Supreme Court of Taiwan upheld the sentence against Ma Chih-wei, a former spokesperson for the TPP's Taoyuan City chapter, who was charged with violating the Anti-Infiltration Act—a law designed to prevent Chinese espionage—and ordered the forfeiture of his criminal proceeds.

The Supreme Court stated that Ma, despite knowing that China is a hostile foreign force, allowed himself to be recruited through financial incentives and became a collaborator within Taiwan, adding that "the defendant's nature of the crime is grave and he shows no signs of remorse."

According to the verdict, after being recruited by a United Front work operative in China in early April 2023, Ma received $15,000 USD (approximately 20 million KRW) from a Chinese foundation in April and May of that year. He also received 19,322 units of the cryptocurrency Tether (USDT), totaling approximately 1.05 million New Taiwan dollars (about 47.57 million KRW) between October and December of the same year.

Ma used these Chinese funds to run for the legislative seat in Taoyuan City's 1st Electoral District in the January 2024 elections.

Following instructions from his Chinese handler, he handed over information to China, including the names and contact details of personnel at the Presidential Office, the Executive Yuan, the National Security Council (NSC), the Ministry of Justice’s Investigation Bureau, and the National Security Bureau (NSB), which handles national security-related crimes. He also provided blueprints for technology enterprise equipment and data on Taiwanese political public opinion.

Meanwhile, Liang Wen-chieh, Deputy Minister and spokesperson for the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC), Taiwan's agency responsible for mainland China affairs, announced the day prior that the Taiwanese citizenship of Zhou Manzi, a Chinese spouse of a Taiwanese man sentenced to eight years in prison by the Supreme Court for violating the National Security Act, would be revoked.

According to prosecutorial investigations, Zhou obtained a Taiwanese ID after marrying a Taiwanese citizen in 2014. In 2017, she met Huang Lanxiang, the head of the United Front Work Department of Hunan Province, in China, and was recruited the following May by Cui Guowei, executive director of the Shanxi Patriotic Volunteer Association, which operates under the provincial-level United Front Work Department of the Chinese Communist Party.

Under Cui's instructions, she worked to establish a Taiwan chapter, signed the "Declaration for the Patriotic Unification of the Taiwan Strait," and planned to carry out United Front operations, such as promoting "One Country, Two Systems," through the New Immigrant Care Association in Taiwan.

The United Front strategy is a political and propaganda tactic used in communist revolutionary stages to mobilize sympathizers and isolate opposing forces.