■ Crime
Drug smugglers get death
Nine Taiwanese people convicted of smuggling heroin into China have been sentenced to penalties ranging from death to life in prison, a newspaper reported yesterday. The Taiwanese and a Chinese accomplice were convicted of smuggling 3.9kg of heroin in travelers' luggage into the southeastern port of Xiamen last year, the Communist Party mouthpiece People's Daily said. Xiamen is the closest Chinese port to Taiwan. A court in Xiamen sentenced four of the Taiwanese to death and four to death with a two-year suspension, the newspaper said in its overseas edition. The other Taiwanese and the Chinese defendant received life in prison. One of those sentenced to death was identified as Chen Jinzhong and one of those with a suspended death sentence as Jian Hongrong. Suspended death sentences in China often are commuted to life in prison if the convicts are deemed reformed.
■ Politics
King supports Chinese law
Cambodia's retired king Norodom Sihanouk has endorsed China's "Anti-Secession" Law, which authorizes military action against Taiwan if it pursues formal independence. Sihanouk, in a statement seen yesterday on his official Web site, said he, his wife and former Queen Monineath -- as well as their son, current King Norodom Sihamoni -- "wish to support 100 percent the rightful stance of the People's Republic of China on the Anti-Secession Law." The statement, in the Cambodian language, was dated Friday. Sihanouk, 82, is a close ally of China, which provided him refuge after he was removed from power in a 1970 coup in Cambodia. He is currently in Beijing receiving medical treatment.
■ Diplomacy
Berger accepts invite
Guatemalan President Oscar Berger on Friday accepted an invitation from visiting Republic of China Vice President Annette Lu (呂秀蓮) to visit Taiwan in August. Lu, who is currently on a three-day visit in Guatemala, called on Berger Friday and presented him with a satellite photo of Guatemala City, capital of the Central American country, taken by the satellite ROCSAT-II. Lu extended an invitation to Berger to visit Taiwan to attend the inauguration of the Democratic Pacific Union (DPU) on Aug. 14. Lu and her counterparts from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua earlier attended a DPU regional meeting in Guatemala. The DPU, the brainchild of the vice president, will be comprised of representatives of Pacific democracies to create a new alliance in the Pacific region to advance democracy, peace and prosperity. Berger accepted the invitation and expressed the hope that the two countries could sign a free trade agreement (FTA) by then.
■ Business
Dane envisions design hub
Danish designer Frederick Rickmann said yesterday that he expects Taiwan will become a regional design hub by 2015 because of continued advancement of investments and education in the field of design. The chief executive and design director of the design company Designnord made the comments while calling on Johnsee Lee, president of the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI). Rickmann is visiting the country at the invitation of the ITRI to lecture at a three-day ITRI seminar titled "Methods for Innovated Design with Modern Thoughts," which will begin March 24.
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,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods