Restrictions barring Chinese students from enrolling at Taiwanese colleges could be lifted, pending further research into the matter, the nation's top cross-strait policymaker said yesterday.
However, Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) officials were quick to equivocate on the issue, stressing that the policy was still being deliberated and that no timeframe had yet been set for its implementation.
During the 11th Congress of the Asian Federation of Taiwan Chambers of Commerce in Kaohsiung yesterday, MAC Chairman Joseph Wu (
"President Chen Shui-bian [
As cross strait economic and civil exchanges become more common, MAC will also relax rules to promote cross-strait exchanges," Wu added.
However, MAC officials pointed to the difficulties that the new policy posed, saying that it would involve cooperation from other agencies, such as the Ministry of Education.
"This policy touches upon so many different issues. For example, if these students are to stay in Taiwan for over a year, there is the question of whether national health insurance should be extended to them. Also, as college is a four year program, we need to consider whether these students can work in Taiwan," MAC Department of Cultural and Educational Affairs Director Chen Huei-ying (
With regards to when the policy could be enacted, Chen responded that the council was "taking it one step at a time."
Despite the difficulties involved, there are precedents for cross-strait educational exchange. Two years ago, the MAC authorized the establishment of Taiwan-based continuing education programs in China. In addition, several Chinese students have been allowed to perform graduate-level research in Taiwan for periods of several months.
LOUD AND PROUD Taiwan might have taken a drubbing against Australia and Japan, but you might not know it from the enthusiasm and numbers of the fans Taiwan might not be expected to win the World Baseball Classic (WBC) but their fans are making their presence felt in Tokyo, with tens of thousands decked out in the team’s blue, blowing horns and singing songs. Taiwanese fans have packed out the Tokyo Dome for all three of their games so far and even threatened to drown out home team supporters when their team played Japan on Friday. They blew trumpets, chanted for their favorite players and had their own cheerleading squad who dance on a stage during the game. The team struggled to match that exuberance on the field, with
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. The single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 400,000 and 800,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, saber-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. A single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 800,000 to 400,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, sabre-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Whether Japan would help defend Taiwan in case of a cross-strait conflict would depend on the US and the extent to which Japan would be allowed to act under the US-Japan Security Treaty, former Japanese minister of defense Satoshi Morimoto said. As China has not given up on the idea of invading Taiwan by force, to what extent Japan could support US military action would hinge on Washington’s intention and its negotiation with Tokyo, Morimoto said in an interview with the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) yesterday. There has to be sufficient mutual recognition of how Japan could provide
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