Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Lien Chan (連戰) may not return from his historic trip to China with a solution to all cross-strait disputes -- but he could have Taiwan's first giant panda in tow, a local Chinese-language newspaper reported yesterday.
The paper said yesterday -- without mentioning a source -- that Chinese President Hu Jintao (
Lien and Hu are expected to meet in Beijing this week -- the first high-level contact between leaders of the two sides in more than five decades.
While not confirming the report, Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (
Training
"Our animal specialists have had contacts with their mainland counterparts recently and have received a degree of training," Ma said.
The specialists will be ready to handle the job after given a further few months of intensive training, Ma said.
Ma said bamboo grown in Zhuzihu on Yangmingshan will supply food for the pandas, although more will have to be planted to meet the demand.
Imperiled species
However, as the panda is one of the imperiled species protected under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), it still requires the approval of the agricultural authorities of both sides before it can be exported from China to Taiwan, Ma noted.
A zoo enclosure could be completed before year's end and staff training could be wrapped up within months -- at a cost of about NT$50 million (US$1.58 million).
Pandas are among the world's rarest animals. About 1,600 giant pandas survive in the wild, mostly in the mountains in southwestern China. Some 160 live in captivity.
Donating the rare animals to prominent world leaders is a tradition that goes back at least to 1972, when then US president Richard Nixon made a historic visit to China.
Through analyzing fossil evidence, a research team at National Taiwan University (NTU) discovered the largest endemic bird to have lived in Taiwan, naming it Pavo miejue, or extinct peafowl (滅絕孔雀). The Mikado pheasant, which is printed on the back of the NT$1,000 bank note, was previously believed to be the biggest endemic bird to Taiwan. The research team’s findings suggest that Pavo miejue lived during the Pleistocene epoch tens of thousands of years ago. It is the first endemic extinct bird species discovered and formally named in Taiwan. The study was coauthored by NTU Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修),
In a historic first, Taiwanese officials participated in this year’s Riga Strategic Communications Dialogue in Latvia from Wednesday to Friday last week, which debuted a breakout session focused on Taiwan The event organizer, the NATO Strategic Communications Center of Excellence, displayed Taiwan’s national flag and the officials’ formal titles on their Web site. Taiwanese attendees included National Security Council (NSC) Deputy Secretary-General Lin Fei-fan (林飛帆) and deputy head of the Taipei Representative Office in the UK, Chiang Ya-chi (江雅綺). In addition to the session discussing Taiwan titled “Taiwan: Navigating Strategic Communication in a Tense Environment,” the dialogue also included sessions
Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport is to suspend its automated Skytrain service connecting Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 starting on July 1 to facilitate connection works for the upcoming Terminal 3, the airport operator said today. Passengers and staff who need to travel between the two terminals after the suspension can instead use the Taoyuan MRT or the airport's 24-hour shuttle bus service, Taoyuan International Airport Corp said. The Taoyuan MRT Airport Line directly links the two terminals, while the shuttle buses are to operate around the clock, the company added. The Skytrain provides free transportation between the airport’s two terminals for travelers and
Taiwan ranked 42nd in terms of peacefulness among 163 countries, down five places from last year, according to this year’s Global Peace Index. With an overall score of 1.751, Taiwan dropped from 37th last year, the report published by the global Institute for Economics and Peace showed. The overall score measures a country’s level of peacefulness using 23 quantitative and qualitative indicators across three domains — ongoing domestic and international conflict, societal safety and security, and militarization. While Taiwan ranked 42nd worldwide, it was listed in ninth place among the 19 Asian-Pacific countries in the report, after New Zealand, Singapore, Japan, Malaysia,
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