Sun, Aug 03, 2025
HANDOUTS: The Cabinet believes that the legislature’s version of the cash handout is not constitutional, although its own version would retain the provision The Executive Yuan would propose a special budget of NT$545 billion (US$18.15 billion) that includes a nationwide cash handout of NT$10,000, sources said yesterday, adding that a clause would be included to exclude wealthy households from receiving the cash handout.The legislature on July 11 passed
A bipartisan group of US representatives have introduced a draft US-Taiwan Defense Innovation Partnership bill, aimed at accelerating defense technology collaboration between Taiwan and the US in response to ongoing aggression by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).The bill was introduced by US repres
In a warning to Russia, US President Donald Trump on Friday said he was ordering the repositioning of two US nuclear submarines “based on the highly provocative statements” of former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev, who has raised the prospect of war online.Trump wrote on social media that, based
The people of Gaza did not need this week’s official confirmation from UN-backed hunger experts that the “worst-case scenario of famine” was unfolding there. For months they have watched as their children waste away.Over the course of the week, Gaza passed two appalling milestones. The official Pale
NEGOTIATIONS: The nation hopes to lower the 20 percent tariff rate through ongoing negotiations, with chips exempt for now as a US review is still pending The new 20 percent tariff rate the US set on goods from Taiwan is “temporary,” and the government expects to negotiate a lower figure, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday.Tariff rates on semiconductors, electronics, and information and communications technology products are to be determined s
HEADWINDS: The new tariffs add to the challenges already faced by Taiwanese manufacturers, who have been squeezed by unfavorable foreign exchange rates Local manufacturers of machine tools, molds, plastic products and electronic materials are expected to bear the brunt of the newly announced 20 percent US tariff, as their main competitors from Japan and South Korea face lower rates, an impact assessment report obtained by the Taipei Times showed ye
TAITUNG RECORD: A weather station in Dawu recorded 1,851.5mm of rainfall last month, the highest for the month since the township’s station was set up in 1939 Heavy downpours battered Tainan early yesterday, with many parts of the city flooding, including Yongkang District (永康), the Southern Region Weather Center said.The downpour occurred from 5am to 6am, with Yongkang recording the highest hourly accumulated rainfall at 103.5mm, followed by 90.5mm on a
CARGO LOSS: About 50 containers at the stern of the ‘Ever Lunar’ cargo ship went overboard, prompting the temporary closure of the port and disrupting operations Evergreen Marine Corp, Taiwan’s largest container shipper, yesterday said that all crew members aboard the Ever Lunar (長月) were safe after dozens of containers fell overboard off the coast of Peru the previous day.The incident occurred at 9:40am on Friday as the Ever Lunar was anchored and waiting t
Taiwan’s Ministry of Culture (MOC) yesterday officially launched the “We TAIWAN” cultural program on Osaka’s Nakanoshima sandbank, with the program’s mascot receiving overwhelming popularity.According to the MOC, the cultural program, which runs from Aug. 2 to 20, was designed to partner with a
Huang Lu Chin-ju (黃呂錦茹), director of the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) Taipei chapter, on Friday was released on bail of NT$10 million (US$333,056) amid an investigation into the alleged forgery of signatures in a recall campaign targeting two Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers.Bail wa
As Taiwan grapples with high summer temperatures, the Ministry of Environment has launched a new platform called Cool Map to help people locate more than 1,700 shaded or air-conditioned “cool zones” across Taipei, New Taipei City and Tainan.A pilot version of the map is available at https://taiwanc
The Executive Yuan has approved a NT$780 million (US$25.98 million) budget to aid the efforts of local governments to dispose of 15,000 tonnes of asbestos following Typhoon Danas, the Ministry of Environment said on Thursday.Minister of Environment Peng Chi-ming (彭啟明) said that about 15,000 tonnes o
‘LEFT BEHIND’: Unlike high-tech industries, it would be hard for traditional industries to expand to the US, as they need high margins and advanced automation, an expert said The US’ tariff polices are expected to hurt Taiwan’s old-economy industries more than their tech counterparts, as it is harder for the traditional industrial sector to relocate production to the US to avoid tariffs, economics experts said.The White House on Friday announced a 20 percent blanket tari
CALL FOR HELP: An orchid farm director said farmers could not accept the 20% rate, while an aquaculture association head said the 10% rate was acceptable The nation’s orchid and tilapia farmers urged the government to negotiate with Washington for a lower tariff rate to sustain exports to the US.US President Donald Trump on Thursday announced a 20 percent tariff for Taiwan, lower than the 32 percent the US announced on April 2. Implementation had bee
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Wang Ting-yu (王定宇) yesterday urged opposition parties not to put extra stress on Taiwanese tariff negotiators with their additional demands, adding that the talks must be kept confidential to prevent other countries from learning of the deal.The White Ho
Lingering at a day market for laborers in Panyu, an urban village on the outskirts of Guangzhou, Ms Qiu looks dejected. She is looking for a local factory that will hire her for the day to sew clothes — cheap tops and dresses that would be churned out onto China’s e-commerce platforms, or bundled up
US President Donald Trump is staking his reputation as a tough negotiator and slick dealmaker — that has served him well throughout his life — on his ultra-muscular, protectionist tariffs policy.On Friday, the White House released a picture of the US president seen with a smartphone pressed to his e
RESHAPING COMMERCE: Major industrialized economies accepted 15 percent duties on their products, while charges on items from Mexico, Canada and China are even bigger US President Donald Trump has unveiled a slew of new tariffs that boosted the average US rate on goods from across the world, forging ahead with his turbulent effort to reshape international commerce.The baseline rates for many trading partners remain unchanged at 10 percent from the duties Trump im
The US should deepen its cooperation with Taiwan on semiconductor development to counter China’s accelerating growth in the industry, the Research Institute for Democracy, Society and Emerging Technology (DSET) said in a statement on Monday in response to US President Donald Trump’s tariffs policies
The dust has settled on the first phase of Taiwan’s unprecedented mass recall movement. While 24 Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers survived what many considered to be a political death sentence, the real significance lies not in who won or lost, but in what the democratic experiment revealed
National defense is not just about weapons and alliances. It begins in daily life — around the dinner table, at the pharmacy, when you turn on the tap or switch on the light.If Taiwan is serious about defending itself — not only from invasion, but from paralysis — it must broaden its definition of d
CHALLENGE: The 30-year-old Tottenham and South Korea forward said winning the UEFA Europa League made him feel he had achieved everything he could at the club After 10 years with Tottenham, captain Son Heung-min announced yesterday that he plans to leave the English Premier League club.Son, who helped Spurs win the UEFA Europa League title in May, said it was “the most difficult” decision of his career and added the club was supporting him as he looks to
A 33.5m Ferris wheel. Race cars painted in MLB team colors. Food trucks. Live music. Pitching tunnels and batting cages. A chance for photos with the Commissioner’s Trophy and Clydesdales.Of course, there is merchandise available for any fans who forgot to grab their gear supporting the Atlanta Brav
Taiwanese veteran golfer Yani Tseng said she was proud of herself for making the cut at the Women’s British Open in Wales — the first time she has advanced at a major LPGA tour in seven years.“I’m proud of myself because I never gave up,” Tseng told reporters after completing her second round on Fri
Taiwanese pitcher Teng Kai-wei of the San Francisco Giants is set to take the mound today against the New York Mets’ Kodai Senga for his 2025 MLB season debut.Teng was listed as the Giants’ starting pitcher on MLB’s official Web site, following a Friday post on the team’s X account announcing his ca
‘UN-AMERICAN’: Trump decried the public broadcaster, which supported more than 1,500 local radio and television stations for almost 60 years, as a ‘monstrosity’ The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), a cornerstone of US culture for three generations, announced on Friday that it would take steps toward its own closure after being defunded by US Congress — marking the end of a nearly six-decade era in which it fueled the production of renowned educati
RISING RACISM: A Japanese group called on China to assure safety in the country, while the Chinese embassy in Tokyo urged action against a ‘surge in xenophobia’ A Japanese woman living in China was attacked and injured by a man in a subway station in Suzhou, China, Japanese media said, hours after two Chinese men were seriously injured in violence in Tokyo.The attacks on Thursday raised concern about xenophobic sentiment in China and Japan that have been bl
Eleven people, including a former minister, were arrested in Serbia on Friday over a train station disaster in which 16 people died.The concrete canopy of the newly renovated station in the northern city of Novi Sad collapsed on Nov. 1, 2024 in a disaster widely blamed on corruption and poor oversig
Aug. 4 to Aug. 10When Coca-Cola finally pushed its way into Taiwan’s market in 1968, it allegedly vowed to wipe out its major domestic rival Hey Song within five years. But Hey Song, which began as a manual operation in a family cow shed in 1925, had proven its resilience, surviving numerous set
The unexpected collapse of the recall campaigns is being viewed through many lenses, most of them skewed and self-absorbed.The international media unsurprisingly focuses on what they perceive as the message that Taiwanese voters were sending in the failure of the mass recall, especially to China, th
The centuries-old fiery Chinese spirit baijiu (白酒), long associated with business dinners, is being reshaped to appeal to younger generations as its makers adapt to changing times.Mostly distilled from sorghum, the clear but pungent liquor contains as much as 60 percent alcohol. It’s the usual choic
Although sending you an SMS (Short Message Service) verification code provides some security, many apps now use code-generating apps and two-factor authentication instead. But more recently, passkeys now use a biometric approach to logging in. Biometrics can offer an even more secure alternative. F
Denmark’s state-run postal service, PostNord, announced that it would cease letter deliveries at the end of 2025 due to the impact of digitalization. As 95% of its residents now use the Digital Post service, Denmark has seen a 90% decline in letter volumes since 2000, from 1.4 billion to 110 million
A: Apart from the musical Sunset Boulevard, Japanese pop diva Ayumi Hamasaki is also touring Taiwan after a 17-year wait. She’s holding two concerts starting tonight.B: Ayu has the most No. 1 hits of any Japanese solo artist, with 33 total.A: “Time” magazine even crowned her as “The Empress of Pop.”
Two moves show Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕) is gunning for Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) party chair and the 2028 presidential election. Technically, these are not yet “officially” official, but by the rules of Taiwan politics, she is now on the dance floor. Earlier this month Lu confirmed in an interview in Japan’s Nikkei that she was considering running for KMT chair. This is not new news, but according to reports from her camp she previously was still considering the case for and against running. By choosing a respected, international news outlet, she declared it to the world. While the outside world likely paid little attention, domestically the message was unmistakable: She is moving on to a larger stage. Part of the dance is to leave options open before formally committing, and with the chair race due in late September, she has time. If something goes wrong in the meantime, or if power brokers in the party offer her a deal that provides more benefits than taking on the role of chair, she can pivot accordingly. Earlier this year, I suggested that strategically, she would be better off concentrating on her job as Taichung mayor until she is term-limited out of office in December next year. Taichung mayor is obviously a full-time job, and concurrently running the Taipei-headquartered party runs the risk of doing one or both jobs poorly and making mistakes that could imperil her shot at the presidency in 2028. The situation has changed. Current KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫), knowing he is likely to face challengers of a higher caliber than the three relative nobodies already declared, has gone all in on appealing to the base. The base is more likely to turn out to vote in the chair election, so this makes some strategic sense in the short term.
Among Thailand’s Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) villages, a certain rivalry exists between Arunothai, the largest of these villages, and Mae Salong, which is currently the most prosperous. Historically, the rivalry stems from a split in KMT military factions in the early 1960s, which divided command and opium territories after Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) cut off open support in 1961 due to international pressure (see part two, “The KMT opium lords of the Golden Triangle,” on May 20). But today this rivalry manifests as a different kind of split, with Arunothai leading a pro-China faction and Mae Salong staunchly aligned to Taiwan. Last spring at Arunothai’s Jiaolian School, principal Wang Mingming (王明明) had forewarned me of the division between villages, saying, “We are not like the people in Mae Salong. They are rich. Because of the Taiwanese.” Arunothai has in recent years become split in its loyalties between Taiwan and China (see part one, “A tale of two schools,” on May 15), but in Mae Salong, links to Taiwan remain strong. Taiwan-funded monuments pay homage to the Lost Army, villagers wear T-shirts emblazoned with the Republic of China (ROC) flag and tea plantations grown Taiwan’s most famous tea varieties, including Dong Ding (“frozen peak”) Oolong, Oriental Beauty and Jin Xuan (Golden Daylily or Milk Oolong). Even the numerical classifications of the teas — Oolong No. 12 or No. 17, for example — are the same, and the shops resemble those found on Alishan. At the tomb of General Tuan Hsi-wen (段希文) — perched on a Mae Salong hilltop with a view of his ancestral homeland in China’s Yunnan province — a third generation villager wearing a vintage KMT army uniform, Yan Si-Chung (岩思中), greets visitors with sharp military salutes. “Both my father and my grandfather were soldiers in the KMT army,” the 44-year-old
| New Taipei City | 27-35 | 50% |  |
| Hsinchu County | 28-33 | 30% | |
| Hsinchu City | 28-33 | 30% | |
| Taipei City | 27-35 | 60% | |
| Miaoli County | 27-32 | 40% | |
| Taoyuan City | 27-34 | 30% | |
| Keelung City | 27-33 | 50% | |
| Yunlin County | 25-30 | 60% | |
| Taichung City | 26-29 | 60% | |
| Nantou County | 25-29 | 50% | |
| Changhua County | 26-29 | 50% | |
| Chiayi County | 26-30 | 70% | |
| Chiayi City | 25-30 | 70% | |
| Tainan City | 27-30 | 70% | |
| Kaohsiung City | 27-30 | 70% | |
| Pingtung County | 26-29 | 70% | |
| Yilan County | 26-33 | 50% | |
| Hualien County | 26-31 | 50% | |
| Taitung County | 26-30 | 30% | |
| Kinmen County | 28-32 | 30% | |
| Penghu County | 27-29 | 50% | |
| Lienchiang County | 28-31 | 30% | |
RSS