■ Politics
Nominations blocked
The Legislative Yuan yesterday decided to postpone its consideration of Control Yuan nominations made by President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) owing to objections from opposition lawmakers. Chen's request for legislators to consent to the nominations was shelved during a meeting of the opposition-controlled Procedure Committee held to schedule the legislative agenda for next week. The pan-blue camp is dissatisfied with the nominations, especially that of Clement Chang (張建邦), who was nominated for Control Yuan president.
■ Justice
Death sentence times five
A man who admitted to killing six people, including five relatives, for NT$13.21 million (US$409,000) in insurance payments was sentenced to death for a record fifth time, a court official said yesterday. The Chiayi District Court on Monday meted out three death penalties to Chen Jui-chin (陳瑞欽), 54, for killing his three sons. Chen had previously received a life sentence and two other death sentences for murdering two wives and a third woman. An investigation found Chen had killed his first wife in 1985 while she was in hospital, picking up an insurance policy payout worth NT$2 million. Over the next several years, four insurance companies paid Chen a total of NT$11.21 million for the death of his son, Chen Chien-hung (陳建宏), in 1995 and two adopted sons murdered in 1988 and 1998. The investigation said Chen murdered his second wife in 1996 and murdered a third woman in May last year. The previous record number of death sentences awarded to an individual was three, meted out to a man after killing seven people.
■ Crime
Court backtracks on bomber
The Taiwan High Court late last night reversed a decision to release alleged gas bomber Kao Pao-chung (高寶中) on bail, saying the crime posed a potential threat to the nation. Although Kao, accused of having ignited a gas-filled minivan outside Taipei Railway Station two days before the legislative elections, was released by the Taipei District Court on bail of NT$100,000, Taipei City prosecutors appealed the decision last week. Taipei District Court will now rehear the case to decide whether to detain Kao. Kao will be subpoenaed to court again. Police say they've been monitoring Kao's whereabouts since he was released, and restrictions have been in place to prevent him from leaving the country.
■ Science
Satellite photos get push
The National Science Program Office (NSPO) yesterday signed a contract with National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU), which will become one of the main domestic promoters of image products taken by ROCSAT-2, the nation's second satellite, also nicknamed FORMOSAT-2. According to the office, high-resolution images taken by ROCSAT-2 can be used in diverse fields, including disaster prevention, geological survey, environmental monitoring, crops development, land utilities, scientific research and other educational applications. "From now on, users can obtain satellite images through the channel of domestic promoters, including NTNU and other universities," office director Lance Wu (吳作樂) said. The university plans to incorporate satellite images into teaching materials in order to promote students' environmental knowledge.
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
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
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