■ Politics
PFP to contend for post
The People First Party (PFP) announced for the first time yesterday that it would contend for a deputy legislative speaker post. The announcement cast a shadow on the previous belief that both the legislative and deputy legislative speakers will remain Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) members. PFP caucus whip Liu Wen-hsiung (劉文雄) said that caucus members would act uniformly in the speakership race, and that the caucus would cooperate with parties and figures supporting the ROC and opposing independence. The decision was made after PFP chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) returned to Taiwan yesterday and met party lawmakers, according to some reports. So far, three PFP lawmakers, Shen Chih-hwei (沈智慧), Chou Hsi-wei(周錫瑋) and Lee Ching-hua (李慶華), are interested in the deputy speakership, reports said.
■ Aid Efforts
Doctors to go to Sri Lanka
A medical group in Taiwan will leave for Sri Lanka today, one of the countries hardest hit by the catastrophic tsunamis on Sunday, to provide medical service. Liu Chi-chun (劉啟群), president of Taiwan Root Medical Peace Corps, said the group will assess the damage and if needed, will arrange more groups to go there. Taiwan Root has been to Sri Lanka three times for medical assistance, and it last returned from the country in late November. This time it will travel to Batticaloa and Pottubil in southern Sri Lanka. The tsunamis has taken a heavy toll on the nation, with a jail in Galle City being flattened by the tidal waves and half of the inmates drowned. Liu said that the group will carry with them related medical equipment and pharmaceuticals, and that medical services will focus on surgical assistance and the prevention of infectious diseases.
■ Travel
Record set at airport
The number of arrivals, departures and transit visits for the year at Chiang Kai-shek (CKS) International Airport reached a record high of 20 million yesterday, according to airport officials. Lee Tung-yang (李東洋), a Taiwanese passenger returning from a business trip, became the 20 millionth passenger for the year and was mobbed by reporters in the arrivals hall. He was awarded free flight tickets worth NT$100,000 (US$3,107.52) and tax-free gifts at an awards presentation ceremony held by the airport authorities, as were the two passengers immediately before and after him. After the inauguration of the airport in 1979, the number of arrivals and departures for the year was only 4.04 million.
■ Crime
Man `slept' with corpse
A man killed his friend two years ago and has been sleeping beside the corpse since then, television channel CTI reported yesterday. The man, identified only as Chiu, killed his friend with an iron bar during a quarrel when they were drinking at Chiu's home, CTI said. Chiu then wrapped the corpse up in a quilt, tied up the bundle with ropes and left it on his bed. "When the body decomposed and gave out a bad smell, Chiu placed camphor balls and sprayed disinfectant in his bedroom to suppress the bad odor," a policeman from Yungkang Police Station in Tainan County told CTI. "Chiu said he kept the body in his house because he believed this was a good way to reduce his bad karma, but we think he has mental problems," the policeman added. Police arrested Chiu after a neighbor saw the corpse on the bed and alerted police.
■ Politics
Soong `to meet US officials'
People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) left for the US late last night after he returned to Taiwan the day before, according to PFP members. The party officials, who declined to be named, said Soong may meet "influent-ial US officials to discuss matters regarding Taiwan-US relations. Soong and his wife Chen Wan-shui (陳萬水) returned to Taiwan early Monday morning to attend the funeral of former first lady Faina Chiang Fang-liang (蔣方良), the Russian wife of late president Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國). The PFP chairman was formerly the late president's English secretary. According to PFP members, Soong is headed to the US to meet some officials and think-tanks. They refused, however, to elaborate to the press whom Soong is to meet or what they are to talk about.
■ Weather
Snowfall leads to roadblock
Police in Nantou sealed off a major road leading to Hohuan Mountain yesterday evening, with the arrival of a severe cold front that brought snow to the mountain. Police patrolling the area decided to ban all vehicles from entrance because the road became slippery after the snowfall, the Central News Agency reported. Temperat-ures in the mountain area dropped to below freezing at around 5pm yesterday. Cars will be allowed on road again starting from 6am today, but the police said they might have to prolong the road block if the snow continues. At Jade Mountain, Taiwan's highest mountain, the temperature fell below the freezing point yesterday evening. Snow is also expected on the mountain in the coming few days, weather officials said.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
REVENGE TRAVEL: A surge in ticket prices should ease this year, but inflation would likely keep tickets at a higher price than before the pandemic Scoot is to offer six additional flights between Singapore and Northeast Asia, with all routes transiting Taipei from April 1, as the budget airline continues to resume operations that were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, a Scoot official said on Thursday. Vice president of sales Lee Yong Sin (李榮新) said at a gathering with reporters in Taipei that the number of flights from Singapore to Japan and South Korea with a stop in Taiwan would increase from 15 to 21 each week. That change means the number of the Singapore-Taiwan-Tokyo flights per week would increase from seven to 12, while Singapore-Taiwan-Seoul
BAD NEIGHBORS: China took fourth place among countries spreading disinformation, with Hong Kong being used as a hub to spread propaganda, a V-Dem study found Taiwan has been rated as the country most affected by disinformation for the 11th consecutive year in a study by the global research project Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem). The nation continues to be a target of disinformation originating from China, and Hong Kong is increasingly being used as a base from which to disseminate that disinformation, the report said. After Taiwan, Latvia and Palestine ranked second and third respectively, while Nicaragua, North Korea, Venezuela and China, in that order, were the countries that spread the most disinformation, the report said. Each country listed in the report was given a score,
POOR PREPARATION: Cultures can form on food that is out of refrigeration for too long and cooking does not reliably neutralize their toxins, an epidemiologist said Medical professionals yesterday said that suspected food poisoning deaths revolving around a restaurant at Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 Store in Taipei could have been caused by one of several types of bacterium. Ho Mei-shang (何美鄉), an epidemiologist at Academia Sinica’s Institute of Biomedical Sciences, wrote on Facebook that the death of a 39-year-old customer of the restaurant suggests the toxin involved was either “highly potent or present in massive large quantities.” People who ate at the restaurant showed symptoms within hours of consuming the food, suggesting that the poisoning resulted from contamination by a toxin and not infection of the