■ Society
Man keeps mom's body
Police were stunned to discover that a man has lived with his dead mother for more than seven years in the belief that she would come back to life, it was reported yesterday. The man, surnamed Lin, told police that his mother died at his home in Tainan County in March 1999, the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times' sister newspaper) and the television network TVBS reported. Lin, 55, said he was very sad about his mother's death and did not bury her because he firmly believed she would one day return to life. Lin had managed to preserve the body by draining the blood from it, the newspaper said, carrying a photograph. Lin said he recently stopped thinking his mother would be resurrected, prompting him to contact the police. "Initially I thought he said his mother died seven days ago. It's hard to believe," a police officer was seen as saying in a film clip broadcast by TVBS. The police are investigating the case.
■ Politics
Third recall fails to inspire
In preparation for tomorrow's vote, the legislature yesterday began a two-day review of the third recall motion against President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁). The pan-greens largely ignored the review of this recall motion -- as they did the reviews of the two previous recall motions -- and Chen once again refused to submit a written rebuttal. Even pan-blue lawmakers, who initiated the third recall, were late for the review meeting. As a result the meeting, which was scheduled to begin at 9am, didn't get going until 9:50am because there were not enough legislators to constitute a quorum. The meeting was subsequently adjourned from 10am to noon and resumed in the afternoon.
■ Politics
Committee fines Cabinet
A special legislative committee fined the Executive Yuan yesterday for refusing to cooperate in its investigation into the March 19, 2004, shooting of President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and Vice President Annette Lu (呂秀蓮), but the Cabinet refused to pay. The committee investigating "the truth" of the March 19, 2004, shooting said it was fining Cabinet departments and officials between NT$30,000 and NT$100,000 for boycotting the committee and for contempt of the legislature. Government Spokesman Cheng Wen-tsang (鄭文燦) quoted a Council of Grand Justices interpretation as saying that the "319 Committee" was only an "internal organization" of the Legislative Yuan and that the Executive Yuan did not have any obligation to provide documents or allow its officials to be questioned.
■ Politics
Lee undergoes checkup
Former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) visited a hospital for a checkup yesterday after suffering from a high fever over the past couple of days. Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) caucus whip Liao Pen-yen (廖本煙) confirmed that Lee went to the Taipei Veterans General Hospital after meeting TSU caucus leaders and the party's candidates for the year-end mayoral and city councilor elections at his residence in Taoyuan County. Yesterday's meeting was seen as a move to debunk speculation that Lee was unhappy with the TSU's about-face on the legislature's third attempt to recall President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁). Before the two-hour closed-door meeting, Lee made a public speech in which he criticized the Democratic Progressive Party and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) for engaging in political strife.
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