The Presidential Office yesterday dismissed allegations against the first lady and her daughter, calling them personal attacks that were both cruel and inappropriate.
"The Presidential Office feels deep regret over the groundless allegation made by former [Democratic Progressive Party] legislator Ju Gau-jeng (
Ju said on a TV talk show that first lady Wu Shu-jen (
Ju told the audience that President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) father was very close to him and that he had once told him that he did not want to visit Wu's family again because her family was well-off, while his was a poor farming family.
Ju also said that Wu was so dominating that she forced Chen to choose a political career.
The Presidential Office said Chen had been a lawyer before venturing into politics and that after the "Kaohsiung Incident," Wu encouraged Chen to commit himself to Taiwan's democratic development and had supported his volunteering to defend the accused in the "Kaohsiung Incident."
Chen later quit his law practice to enter politics.
The Presidential Office rejected an allegation that Sogo Department Store had sealed off the No. 23 shopping area on its ninth floor for Chen's daughter Chen Hsin-yu (陳幸妤) in the summer of 2004.
Noted political commentator Hu Chung-hsin (
The Presidential Office said Chen Hsin-yu would not have been shopping for business clothes at that time because she was six-months pregnant.
On Monday Sogo dismissed the allegation, saying that it would have been impossible to close off an area for Chen Hsin-yu and noting that its woman's business attire section was on the third floor, not the ninth.
Chen Hsin-yu has already filed a lawsuit against Hu over his allegation on a TV talk show last October that she had opened a US bank account specifically to launder money for her father.
Hu claimed the president's daughter had used the pretext of a meeting in the US to travel there to open a bank account to help her father conceal his assets.
Hu's claim was picked up by several Chinese Web sites, which described Taiwan's first family as a "criminal ring."
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it
Taiwan's Gold Apollo Co (金阿波羅通信) said today that the pagers used in detonations in Lebanon the day before were not made by it, but by a company called BAC which has a license to use its brand. At least nine people were killed and nearly 3,000 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members detonated simultaneously across Lebanon yesterday. Images of destroyed pagers analyzed by Reuters showed a format and stickers on the back that were consistent with pagers made by Gold Apollo. A senior Lebanese security source told Reuters that Hezbollah had ordered 5,000 pagers from Taiwan-based Gold Apollo. "The product was not
COLD FACTS: ‘Snow skin’ mooncakes, made with a glutinous rice skin and kept at a low temperature, have relatively few calories compared with other mooncakes Traditional mooncakes are a typical treat for many Taiwanese in the lead-up to the Mid-Autumn Festival, but a Taipei-based dietitian has urged people not to eat more than one per day and not to have them every day due to their high fat and calorie content. As mooncakes contain a lot of oil and sugar, they can have negative health effects on older people and those with diabetes, said Lai Yu-han (賴俞含), a dietitian at Taipei Hospital of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. “The maximum you can have is one mooncake a day, and do not eat them every day,” Lai