■ Politics
PFP vote results due today
People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) is certain to be re-elected to his party's top post today as he is running unopposed. Some 70,000 party members have voted by mail and the outcome will be announced today, PFP spokesman Hsieh Kung-ping (謝公秉) said yesterday. Hsieh said some 34,000 ballots had already been received. Soong is on vacation in the US.
■ Health
Hepatitis A advice issued
The Department of Health yesterday advised the public to refrain from consuming unwashed food or drinking untreated water to avoid being infected by hepatitis A, amid reports that the number of cases this year is slightly higher than last year. The Center for Disease Control said that the number of confirmed hepatitis A cases has reached 165 this year, higher than the 134 cases during the same period last year, although the cases have been spread around the nation and have yet to produce "cluster infections." Health officials said that after Typhoon Haitang, water could be contaminated by waste or sewage. The officials said that the hepatitis A virus is usually spread from person to person, and more easily spread in places with poor sanitary conditions and by people who do not wash their hands. They noted that children infected with the virus often have no symptoms. Most adults develop symptoms over several days, including fever, fatigue, loss of appetite, nausea, vomiting and stomachache. Jaundice can occur days after infection, and the department urged those who display these symptoms to seek treatment as soon as possible.
■ Education
Thailand wants teachers
The government will send 100 Chinese-language teachers to teach in Thai schools, according to an agreement signed in Taipei yesterday. Under the agreement signed between the National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU) and 14 Thai universities, the teachers will be sent this fall to fill a shortage for Chinese-language teachers from primary up to university level. Thailand has been recruiting teachers from China, but many of the Chinese teachers have used the opportunity to seek permanent residence. The agreement was signed by NTNU's acting president Huang Tsun and Thai Senator Chaowarin Latthasaksiri, a former education minister. The teachers will leave for Thailand in October as the Thai school term begins in November. "They want Taiwanese teachers because Taiwan has a good reputation for teaching Chinese to foreigners and for training Chinese-language teachers to be sent abroad," NTNU spokesman Wang Hsi-ping said.
■ Politics
Chen pushes gender equality
The Presidential Office set up a "gender mainstreaming" advisory panel as part of its effort to promote gender equality, senior Presidential Office official said yesterday. According to Presidential Office Secretary-General Yu Shyi-kun, President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) will host the panel's first meeting early next month. Yu said Chen came up with the idea of the panel after meeting with representatives of the Commission on Women's Rights Promotion and women's groups on March 5. The panel will advise Chen on the direction and methods for promoting gender equality, Yu said, and it will serve as a platform for dialogue between the Presidential Office, the government and social activists.
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