■ Defense
Destroyers to enter service
Two Kidd-class destroyers purchased from the US are will be commissioned today. President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) will officiate at the commissioning ceremony at the Keelung military base for the 1801 Keelung and the 1802 Suao. The two vessels arrived in Suao (蘇澳) on Dec. 8 from Charleston, South Carolina, after a month-long voyage which also included logistics stops at US Navy bases in Hawaii and Guam. Navy authorities said that after the destroyers are commissioned, they will form the outer periphery of a naval defensive fleet, while the Perry-class, Knox-class and Lafayette-class frigates will play an "inner circle" role.
PHOTO: WENG YU-HUANG, TAIPEI TIMES
■ Health
Gerber puree passes tests
The Department of Health announced yesterday that jars of Gerber carrot puree would be back on store shelves after tests showed that the baby food did not have excessive levels of cadium and metal. The tests showed the levels were within the acceptable standards for the EU and New Zealand. The tests were conducted after an alert from Israeli health authorities earlier this week that the Gerber carrot puree in Israel contained excess cadium levels. The carrot puree supplied to Israel was from a different batch than that sold in Taiwan and from a different series. The levels of cadium found in Taiwan were at 0.013ppm.
■ Fisheries
Japanese move defeated
The Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) vetoed a Japanese proposal on Thursday to cut Taiwan's annual tuna fishing quota in the central and western Pacific Ocean. Last month Japan persuaded the International Commission of the Conservation of Atlantic Tuna to slash Taiwan's bigeye tuna fishing quota for next year. It proposed a similar cut for Taiwan's tuna quota in the central and western Pacific at the annual WCPFC meeting now underway in Micronesia. "The Japanese proposal was vetoed after our delegates convincingly explained our fishing operations in the region at the WCPFC session," said Wang Shun-lung, (王順隆) president of the Taiwan Tuna Association. According to a survey conducted in 2000, Taiwan had only seven or eight tuna fishing vessels operating in the region that year, with a total catch of about 998 tonnes.
■ Law
Investigators probe agents
The Ministry of Justice's Investigation Bureau (MJIB) yesterday sent two MJIB agents to the Kaohsiung Prosecutor's Office for questioning over their alleged involvement in leaking information concerning the Kaohsiung Rapid Transit Corp (KRTC) scandal investigation to a Chinese-language newspaper reporter. In addition, an official of the MJIB's Kaohsiung branch surnamed Chen leaked the probe information to former deputy secretary-general to the Presidential Office Chen Che-nan (陳哲男), who was later indicted. The MJIB's Kaohsiung branch official allegedly coached him on how to respond to questioning. Two other MJIB agents were also found to have phone conversations with independent legislator Chiu Yi (邱毅), who had disclosed information regarding the KRTC scandal probe. The bureau yesterday said the three MJIB agents will be disciplined, but the bureau did not get into specifics.
Former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) mention of Taiwan’s official name during a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on Wednesday was likely a deliberate political play, academics said. “As I see it, it was intentional,” National Chengchi University Graduate Institute of East Asian Studies professor Wang Hsin-hsien (王信賢) said of Ma’s initial use of the “Republic of China” (ROC) to refer to the wider concept of “the Chinese nation.” Ma quickly corrected himself, and his office later described his use of the two similar-sounding yet politically distinct terms as “purely a gaffe.” Given Ma was reading from a script, the supposed slipup
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,
The bodies of two individuals were recovered and three additional bodies were discovered on the Shakadang Trail (砂卡礑) in Taroko National Park, eight days after the devastating earthquake in Hualien County, search-and-rescue personnel said. The rescuers reported that they retrieved the bodies of a man and a girl, suspected to be the father and daughter from the Yu (游) family, 500m from the entrance of the trail on Wednesday. The rescue team added that despite the discovery of the two bodies on Friday last week, they had been unable to retrieve them until Wednesday due to the heavy equipment needed to lift