■ Politics
DPP to attend UN meeting
Democratic Progressive Party Department of International Affairs Director Winston Dang (陳重信) said yesterday that he and Examination Yuan President Yao Chia-wen (姚嘉文) would attend meetings held a UN Human Rights Council committee on behalf of Liberal International, an organization of liberal political parties from around the world. Dang said he and Yao would read a declaration of the organization's support for Taiwan joining the WHO. The declaration was posted on the council's Web site on Feb. 28, Dang said. Dang said he had also been invited to host a conference on human rights in Cuba. Conference attendees will include Cuban former political prisoner Osvaldo Alfonso Valdes and former Albanian president Rexhep Meidani.
■ Tourism
Wu unsure on timing
Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) Chairman Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said yesterday that he was not sure when Taiwan would open its doors to Chinese tourists for sightseeing visits, as the technical details still had to be worked out. Five rounds of negotiations on the technical details have been held with Chinese authorities, Wu told reporters at the Legislative Yuan before attending a meeting of the Home and Nations Committee to give a briefing on the MAC's operations. The two sides are preparing to hold another round of talks, Wu said, adding that it was impossible to speculate on when the details would be ironed out. Asked whether the negotiations would be completed before he steps down to take up his new post as the nation's top representative to the US, Wu said only that he hoped the matter would be concluded as soon as possible.
■ Law enforcement
Hou comments on firearms
National Police Agency Director-General Hou You-yi (侯友宜) said yesterday that he strongly supported police carrying handguns, provided the firearms were handled correctly. Hou made the remarks at a news conference held to declare the government's policy of enforcing the laws in a strict manner, after two separate attacks on police officers were reported in Tainan in the past week. On March 15, a traffic violator grabbed the handgun of a highway police officer while being questioned on an expressway, which he then used to shoot another motorist in a failed attempt to hijack the victim's car. The offender then hijacked another car with his companion and fled. The wounded motorist died of his injuries. A few days after the incident, an officer lost his gun to a man with a record of drug offenses after the man attacked him while he was performing an inquiry.
■ Sports
Mayor Hu courts Oh
Taichung Mayor Jason Hu (胡志強) said yesterday that he would invite Sadaharu Oh, a Japan-based professional baseball manager of Chinese descent, to visit Taichung and serve as a spokesman for the international baseball tournament to be hosted in the city. Hu, who plans to leave for Japan tomorrow for a six-day visit, said that Oh had tentatively agreed to visit Taichung. Hu said he hoped to finalize arrangements during his trip to Japan. Oh, a former baseball star, now manages the Fukuoka Softbank Hawks. The Baseball World Cup will be held in November at the new Taichung Intercontinental Baseball Stadium.
■ Medicine
Research fellow honored
An Academia Sinica research fellow has been awarded the post of honorary fellow at the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology for his work developing the first biomedication for asthma. Chang Tse-wen (張子文), a member of the institution's Genomics Research Center, determined that immunoglobulin E (IgE) is the genetic pathogen for allergic diseases and started developing an anti-IgE medication, Xolair, which was subsequently approved by the US Food and Drug Administration. Xolair is the first treatment to address pathogens without side effects and Chang is developing a second-generation anti-allergic biomedication.
■ Telecoms
Companies face penalties
The National Communications Commission (NCC) said yesterday that Chunghwa Telecom, Taiwan Mobile Co and Far Eastone must by March 31, reduce processing times for customer applications to switch to a new service provider , or face punishment. The commission had previously announced that the three companies would be fined after investigations indicated that they give priority to customers who wish to upgrade their mobile phone service but are inclined to delay handling applications to change provider. Currently, it takes between a week and nine days for these applications to be processed, which the commission deems a business strategy to prevent customers seeking new service providers. NCC spokesman Howard Shyr (石世豪) reiterated that the commission had determined delays in the processing of applications violated the Telecommunications Act (電信法).
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching