■Water
Chlorine added to fight SARS
The Taiwan Water Works is adding four times the usual amount of chlorine to tap water to help prevent the spread of SARS. An official of the water works said yesterday that the company has begun to increase chlorine in running water from 0.2 parts per million to 1.0 ppm. The chloride-enriched water is still safe to drink, he said, adding that chloride in the water will dissipate after three to five minutes of boiling.
■ Cross-strait ties
Illegal migrants detained
The Coast Guard Administration intercepted and arrested 16 illegal immigrants from China in Shanchi, Taipei County early yesterday morning. The detainees were given cursory health examinations and were made to wear surgical masks before being questioned individually. After a recent incident an entire contingent of coast guard personnel had to be put into quarantine because one member was suspected of being infected with SARS, the truck that was to transport the illegal immigrants was thoroughly disinfected by personnel wearing protective suits. The Chinese will have to undergo a 10-day quarantine before being sent to a detention center.
■ Crime
Huge Ecstasy bust reported
Taipei police on Wednesday arrested a man who admitted that he smuggled in high-grade Ecstasy, from the Netherlands and confiscated more than 200,000 pills in the largest bust ever in Taiwan. Police were tipped off that a couple were pedaling the pills in pubs in downtown Taipei. To trace the source of the drugs, police targeted a man surnamed Wang, who was a pub owner. Police reportedly caught Wang and Huang Chin-cheng (黃進成) when the two were discussing a deal in Hsichi on Wednesday. Police seized 3,000 Ecstasy pills at the time. Huang had reportedly hidden more pills in Kueishan, Taipei County, where police discovered 200,000 Ecstasy pills in four large boxes, with a market value of NT$60 million.
■ Health care
Court convicts nurses
A court yesterday convicted two nurses of manslaughter for giving anesthetic shots to seven infants by mistake, killing one child, a Panchiao District Court official said. Huang Ching-hui (黃靖惠), the nurse who administered the injections, and Li Mei-yun (李美雲) were sentenced to two years and 18 months in prison respectively, the official said. Li, however, was given a five-year suspension on her sentence. The incident occurred on Nov. 29 when the nurses at Pei Cheng clinic mistakenly gave seven babies anesthetic shots instead of hepatitis vaccinations. Both substances were stored in the same freezer.
■ Espionage
Man sentenced for spying
A court in northeast China has sentenced a man to 11 years in jail for handing over classified documents to a secret agent from Taiwan, state media reported yesterday. Fu Jian, a 51-year-old Communist Party official at an oil management department, was sentenced at Jinzhou Intermediary Court in Liaoning province "recently," Xinhua News Service said. Fu handed over classified 58 documents to a Taiwanese intelligence officer over a five-year period ending May of last year, the news service reported. The news agency did not provide details about what kind of documents Fu delivered to his Taiwanese contact, identified as Lu Yi-chun.
Agencies
An increase in Taiwanese boats using China-made automatic identification systems (AIS) could confuse coast guards patrolling waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast and become a loophole in the national security system, sources familiar with the matter said yesterday. Taiwan ADIZ, a Facebook page created by enthusiasts who monitor Chinese military activities in airspace and waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast, on Saturday identified what seemed to be a Chinese cargo container ship near Penghu County. The Coast Guard Administration went to the location after receiving the tip and found that it was a Taiwanese yacht, which had a Chinese AIS installed. Similar instances had also
GOOD DIPLOMACY: The KMT has maintained close contact with representative offices in Taiwan and had extended an invitation to Russia as well, the KMT said The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) would “appropriately handle” the fallout from an invitation it had extended to Russia’s representative to Taipei to attend its international banquet last month, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday. US and EU representatives in Taiwan boycotted the event, and only later agreed to attend after the KMT rescinded its invitation to the Russian representative. The KMT has maintained long-term close contact with all representative offices and embassies in Taiwan, and had extended the invitation as a practice of good diplomacy, Chu said. “Some EU countries have expressed their opinions of Russia, and the KMT respects that,” he
VIGILANCE: The military is paying close attention to actions that might damage peace and stability in the region, the deputy minister of national defense said The People’s Republic of China (PRC) might consider initiating a hack on Taiwanese networks on May 20, the day of the inauguration ceremony of president-elect William Lai (賴清德), sources familiar with cross-strait issues said. While US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s statement of the US expectation “that all sides will conduct themselves with restraint and prudence in the period ahead” would prevent military actions by China, Beijing could still try to sabotage Taiwan’s inauguration ceremony, the source said. China might gain access to the video screens outside of the Presidential Office Building and display embarrassing messages from Beijing, such as congratulating Lai
Four China Coast Guard ships briefly sailed through prohibited waters near Kinmen County, Taipei said, urging Beijing to stop actions that endanger navigation safety. The Chinese ships entered waters south of Kinmen, 5km from the Chinese city of Xiamen, at about 3:30pm on Monday, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement later the same day. The ships “sailed out of our prohibited and restricted waters” about an hour later, the agency said, urging Beijing to immediately stop “behavior that endangers navigation safety.” Ministry of National Defense spokesman Sun Li-fang (孫立方) yesterday told reporters that Taiwan would boost support to the Coast Guard