■ Crime
Dead man's kin seek help
The family of a murdered China-based businessman appealed yesterday for government assistance in solving the murder. The mother, sister and nephew of Ho Ching-sheng (何進陞) called a news conference to ask the government to look into claims by Chinese authorities that Ho was killed in a scuffle following a traffic accident. They also called for China to arrest five suspects who are at large. Two suspects have been arrested. Ho, 48, from Fengyuan, Taichung, was in the electroplating business in Guangdong Province for more than a decade. He reportedly had a dispute with some Chinese when he and a woman went for a snack early last Wednesday morning. Ho died of massive bleeding after his arms and legs were cut off. The family identified the body last Friday and then brought his ashes back to Taiwan.
■ Crime
Two drug suspects nabbed
Police arrested the two alleged kingpins of a drug gang on Monday in Kangsan, Kaohsiung County, and seized 1.314kg of heroin, according to a report by the Nantze police station. The arrest came three months after Kaohsiung District Court Prosecutor Chiang Li-ju (姜麗儒) received a report that a drug gang, reportedly led by suspect Chen Kuo-lin (陳國林), 39, had smuggled large quantities of heroin into the country by fishing boat or container ship. Police intercepted a sedan at an expressway interchange at Kangsan on Monday afternoon and found four blocks of heroin. They arrested Chen and Shih Pao-hsing (施保行). The heroin had a street value of NT$50 million (US$1.47 million). The police are trying to find the sources of the drug and the other members of the gang, the report said.
■ Society
Blind to climb Hsuehshan
A group of vision-impaired people from six Asian countries will scale Hsueh-shan next week, the Chinese Taipei Orienteering Asso-ciation (CTOA) said yester-day. This will mark the first time that blind people from home and abroad have joined together to scale a high peak in this country, association president Peng Mu-shan (彭木山) said. In the past few years, Peng said, the CTOA has helped vision-impaired people to climb Yushan and Dabajianshan, as well as Japan's Mount Fuji. "We have invited vision-impaired people from Thai-land, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea and Japan to join their local counterparts in conquering the 3,201m-high Hsuehshan," Peng said, adding that the event is aimed at promoting inter-national friendship and helping vision-impaired people expand leisure activities. Peng said 24 blind Taiwanese will take part in the expedition that starts on Monday.
■ Culture
Cloud Gate to appear in NYC
The Cloud Gate Dance Theater will give four per-formances at the Howard Gilman Opera House in New York later this month as part of the Next Wave Festival, at the invitation of the Brooklyn Academy of Music and the Asia Society. This is the third time that Cloud Gate has been invited to attend the Next Wave Festival. At a press conference at the Taipei Cultural Center in New York on Monday, Lin Hwai-min (林懷民), Cloud Gate's founder, said that the group will perform Moon Water at the festival. On Nov. 19, the Asia Society will also sponsor a lecture demonstration with Lin that will introduce his sources of inspiration.
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