■ Cross-strait Ties
UNI plans ferry link
UNI Airways Corp is planning to start a joint venture later this month with a Xiamen-based ferry company to transport Taiwanese businesspeople traveling between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait, according to a company spokesman. The joint venture, to be launched on Feb. 16 under the "small three links" framework, will offer a sea-air round trip ticket for NT$5,200 for travelers between Xiamen and destinations on Taiwan proper via Kinmen, the spokesman said. Passengers will first ferry between Xiamen and Kinmen before flying to on Taipei, Kaohsiung, Taichung, Tainan or Chiayi aboard a UNI airplane, he said.
■ Environment
Dead whale was paralyzed
A scientist said that a sperm whale that was beached on the western coast last month apparently hit a ship and injured the nerves in its spine before it died, a newspaper reported yesterday. Biologist Wang Chien-ping (王建平) based his theory on an autopsy he has been performing on the 17m-long whale since it was found Jan. 24 off Yunlin County's coast, the newspaper said. Wang, who teaches at National Cheng Kung University, said that the nerves on a section of the whale's spine were severed, the paper reported. The damage apparently paralyzed the mammal, causing it to drift onto the coast, he said. Wang thought that the whale must have been injured in a collision with a large ship about one or two weeks before it was beached, the paper said. An analysis of the skeleton showed that its age was between 50 and 60, he said.
■ Health
Chen urges blood donations
President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) urged people yesterday to donate blood to help relieve a serious blood shortage. He made the appeal during a visit to Taipei City's blood donation center. Chen said he had originally intended to donate blood himself. However, his blood was rejected as he had visited Panama -- a malaria-endemic area -- less than a year ago. Chen visited Panama last November and government regulations bar those who have visited a communicable disease-affected area from donating blood within a year of their return. "I feel regret that I cannot donate blood this time around," Chen said, adding that he will instead encourage the Presidential Office staff to donate blood in the hopes of inspiring others to follow suit. Chen said donating blood is both an act of self-interest and of altruism that can help boost social harmony. "Through donating blood, we can help save our own lives, those of our families and those of other people," he said. "Let us be happy blood donors."
■ Health
CLA ponders checks
With the number of people dying of bird flu virus in Southeast Asia rising, the Council of Labor Affairs may consider preventive measures to prevent foreign workers from bringing in the disease, Chairwoman Chen Chu (陳菊) said yesterday. Chen said the council may consider adopting preventive measures similar to the ones taken during the height of the outbreaks of SARS last year for workers from Southeast Asian countries that have been identified as avian flu-affected areas by the World Health Organization. Implementation, however, will be worked out after the council communicates with the Department of Health, Chen said.
Former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) mention of Taiwan’s official name during a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on Wednesday was likely a deliberate political play, academics said. “As I see it, it was intentional,” National Chengchi University Graduate Institute of East Asian Studies professor Wang Hsin-hsien (王信賢) said of Ma’s initial use of the “Republic of China” (ROC) to refer to the wider concept of “the Chinese nation.” Ma quickly corrected himself, and his office later described his use of the two similar-sounding yet politically distinct terms as “purely a gaffe.” Given Ma was reading from a script, the supposed slipup
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
The bodies of two individuals were recovered and three additional bodies were discovered on the Shakadang Trail (砂卡礑) in Taroko National Park, eight days after the devastating earthquake in Hualien County, search-and-rescue personnel said. The rescuers reported that they retrieved the bodies of a man and a girl, suspected to be the father and daughter from the Yu (游) family, 500m from the entrance of the trail on Wednesday. The rescue team added that despite the discovery of the two bodies on Friday last week, they had been unable to retrieve them until Wednesday due to the heavy equipment needed to lift