■ Crime
Liu Tai-ying out on bail
The Taipei District Court decided to release former China Development Holding Corp chairman Liu Tai-ying (劉泰英) on NT$20 million bail late on Monday evening after prosecutors applied to detain him on charges of embezzlement and money laundering because of his alleged involvement in a scandal about a secret fund to secure diplomatic relations with South Africa. Taipei Chief Prosecutor Hsueh Wei-ping (薛維平) said that he will consider whether to appeal the bail decision after he carefully reviews the verdict in the next seven days or so. Liu is also on a NT$60 million bail for his involvement in the Zanadau scandal. His NT$80 million total bail is a national record. Hsueh first applied to detain Liu on Aug. 15 but the district court decided to release him without bail on Aug. 16. Hsueh immediately appealed to the high court and his appeal was granted on Sept. 23. Monday's rehearing was the result of the high court's decision.
■ Travel
Warning issued for Spain
The Tourism Bureau issued a travel warning yesterday to tourists heading for Spain. "Taiwanese must be aware of the possible dangers of robbery and injuries while traveling in Spain," the bureau said in a statement. The warning came after two women from a 27-member Taiwanese tour group were cut and robbed by three knife-wielding men after they stepped off a tour bus in front of a Madrid hotel on Monday. The robbers also attacked the tour guide before fleeing, according to the bureau.
■ Sport
Triathlon set for Saturday
The nation's fittest men and women will challenge their physical limits Oct. 11 in Taiwan's 12th annual triathlon in Taitung County. Participants will swim 1.5km, ride a bicycle 40km and then run 10km. Taitung County Commissioner Hsu Ching-yuan (徐慶元) is urging more people to participate. More than 600 people have registered already, including Ma and his bodyguards, a Taipei City Government team comprised of police department bureau chiefs and former city Information Department director King Pu-tsung (金浦聰).
■ Culture
Contest lures potters
The first Taiwan International Ceramics Festival has attracted 692 entries from 47 countries for the competition to be held next January, the Council for Cultural Affairs said yesterday. Council Chairwoman Tchen Yu-chiou (陳郁秀) said 125 local and overseas artists have been selected as qualifiers to vie for the top prize of NT$1.3 million (US$38,460). Among the qualifiers, 25 are from Taiwan and the rest hail from 26 countries. Many well-known ceramics artists are competing in the festival, such as the modern pottery master Rudy Autio from the US and Steven Montgomery, who just won a gold medal in a competition in South Korea.
■ Agriculture
Flamingo flowers flourish
Flamingo flowers grown in a small southern Taiwan village have conquered Japan. Chuang Chun-chin (莊竣欽), head of a floral production cooperative in Tainan County's Chungshe village, said that since he took the initiative to plant flamingo flowers in styrofoam containers a few years ago, the imported floral species has grown well in his village. "The success rate is almost 100 percent, " Chuang said. Chuang said Taiwan is now Japan's largest flamingo flower supplier, accounting for a 39 percent market share.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching