■ Legislature
Arms bill rejected again
The Procedure Committee yesterday rejected the long-stalled arms procurement plan, for the 30th time, as well as the confirmation of President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) nominees for the Control Yuan. The pan-blue dominated committee voted down the two bills yet again. However, it did place the proposed amendments to the Statute Governing the Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (兩岸人民關係條例), amendments to the Organic Law of the Judicial Yuan (司法院組織法) and the special flood-control bill proposed by the People First Party (PFP) caucus on the legislative agenda. The committee also elected three conveners to take turns chairing the weekly meeting. They are Democratic Progressive Party caucus whip William Lai (賴清德), Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip Pan Wei-kang (潘維剛) and PFP caucus whip Lin Hui-kuan (林惠官).
■ Diplomacy
Lee's speech confirmed
The National Press Club in Washington confirmed on Monday that former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) will give a speech at the club on Oct. 20. A club official said Lee will also take questions from the audience after his speech. In addition, the Formosan Association for Public Affairs (FAPA), which is in charge of Lee's itinerary while in Washington, has also arranged for him to give a brief speech at a luncheon on Capitol Hill. David Lee (李大維), the nation's representative to the US, said Monday that he will act according to the protocol for greeting former heads of state set up by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs two years ago. Lee will also probably meet with Alaska Governor Frank Murkowski in Anchorage before he flies to New York, Washington and Los Angeles. Lee visited the US in 1995 and spoke at his alma mater, Cornell University, triggering vehement protests from Beijing. After retiring in 2000, he again visited Cornell in June 2001.
■ Weather
Typhoon may head this way
Typhoon Longwang, the 19th typhoon this year, has increased its intensity to that of a medium typhoon and it will be clear in about three days whether it will affect the country, the Central Weather Bureau reported yesterday. It is uncertain yet whether Longwang, still 2,100km away, will affect the nation because the high pressure over the Pacific Ocean is not stable. The situation will be clearer by Friday. If Longwang moves toward Taiwan, a warning could be issued on Sunday, the bureau said.
■ Education
Foreign students in Taichung
More than 200 students from 36 countries have been studying Chinese language and culture at Providence University in Shalu (沙鹿) Township, Taichung County, since the beginning of the month, university officials said. The school has the number of foreign students of any university or college in the central Taiwan, according to the university, whose Chinese Language Education Center (CLEC) began enrolling students in 1996. One of the CLEC students, Alexander Oxmar Ramireg Bazan from Paraguay, said he is grateful to his government giving him chance to study at the university. Cyntia Bahiana Esinolamonges, also from Paraguay, said she had been warmly greeted at the airport by a CLEC teacher and students from the Spanish language and culture department. The kindness of Taiwanese people was her first impression of the country, she said.
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
A bipartisan group of US senators has introduced a bill to enhance cooperation with Taiwan on drone development and to reduce reliance on supply chains linked to China. The proposed Blue Skies for Taiwan Act of 2026 was introduced by Republican US senators Ted Cruz and John Curtis, and Democratic US senators Jeff Merkley and Andy Kim. The legislation seeks to ease constraints on Taiwan-US cooperation in uncrewed aerial systems (UAS), including dependence on China-sourced components, limited access to capital and regulatory barriers under US export controls, a news release issued by Cruz on Wednesday said. The bill would establish a "Blue UAS
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