■ Politics
Premier confirms promotion
Premier Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) yesterday confirmed that deputy minister of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Winston Dang (陳重信) will be promoted to become the minister of the agency, a post which was left vacant after former minister Chang Kow-lung (張國龍) resigned along with former premier Su Tseng-chang's (蘇貞昌) Cabinet last month. Former Democratic Progressive Party legislator Tsai Huang-liang (蔡煌瑯) will serve as the deputy chairman of the National Council on Physical Fitness and Sports, Chang said. Minister without Portfolio Ho Mei-yueh (何美玥) will double as the chairwoman of the Council for Economic Planning and Development, he said.
■ Travel
UK visa changes on the way
Starting next month, all applicants for a UK visa will have to provide fingerprint scans and personal digital photos, the British Trade and Cultural Office (BTCO) announced yesterday. The British government is introducing the collection of biometric data for all visa applicants worldwide, it added. The new measures will start on July 26 and all applicants will have to apply for a visa in person at the BTCO so their photo can be taken and they can be fingerprinted. BTCO director Michael Reilly said that biometric visas provide a higher standard of security and will in time make entry clearance into the UK simpler and easier. The changes will help improve security checks and prevent fraudulent visa use and the abuse of the UK's immigration and asylum system, he said.
■ Health
Diverse treatments popular
Over half of the country's families have tried Chinese medicine, Western medicine and folk therapy as medical treatment options have become more diversified, a National Cheng Kung University hospital official said on Wednesday. Huang Ying-hsiang (黃盈翔) said that a study on the medical treatment of 2,000 families around the country found that nearly half of rural families and nearly two-thirds of urban families have sought the three different forms of treatment. Western medicine is still the mainstream therapy although traditional Chinese medicine has become the next-most commonly sought after treatment while the use of alternative therapies have also become popular. The results of a survey conducted in 2003 showed that 75 percent of respondents said they would be willing to seek at least one kind of alternative therapy. Those who have received higher education, are middle class and in poor health, and women suffering from anxiety, chronic pain or urinary problems, are more likely to seek alternative therapy, the study found.
■ Society
Drunk driving killing more
Drunk driving has become the No. 1 cause of deaths on public roads, according to statistics in a report released by the Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday. The ministry said 727 people died last year as a result of drunk driving-related road accidents. The report pointed out that in 2001, drunk driving ranked third among all causes of road deaths before becoming the second leading cause in 2002. Since 2004, the number of road accidents due to drunk drinking has increased about 30 percent each year from 2,502 in 2004 to 2,999 last year, accounting for 16.7 percent and 36.5 percent of annual road traffic accidents respectively. The number of deaths caused by drunk driving also rose from 454 in 2004 to 547 in 2005, and to 727 last year.
■ Entertainment
Station to shoot 100 films
Videoland Movie Channel, the country's first cable television channel dedicated to showing Chinese-language films, announced yesterday that it will set aside NT$1 billion (US$30.2 million) to produce 100 digital films over the next five years. Company president Hu Kuan-chen (胡冠珍) told reporters that her company would also spend millions to recruit writing talent. Hu, 38, is a former actress who has starred in 18 films. She made the announcement two days after the channel celebrated its 15th anniversary. Her deputy, Yao Ching-kang (姚慶康) -- who has written 36 plays -- said Videoland would begin to shoot films in different genres in Hong Kong, Taiwan and China this year, and that the company would place more emphasis on good screenplays than on big name stars.
■ Education
Smart house unveiled
National Cheng Kung University yesterday launched an innovative "house of quality life" that brings together advanced technology, user-friendly interfaces and creative interior designs to present a vision of a better living space, the Tainan-based university said. Kevin Yang (楊家輝), director of the university's Institute of Computer and Communications Engineering, explained that the house was the result of a collaboration between seven departments and institutes, and was representative of the university's interdisciplinary capabilities. The house features flexible walls and partitions, a wireless sensing network, a large 3D display, user-oriented lighting and appliance control, and "virtual" windows that can remember user preferences and which adjust automatically to favor "comfortable" conditions, the university said.
LOUD AND PROUD Taiwan might have taken a drubbing against Australia and Japan, but you might not know it from the enthusiasm and numbers of the fans Taiwan might not be expected to win the World Baseball Classic (WBC) but their fans are making their presence felt in Tokyo, with tens of thousands decked out in the team’s blue, blowing horns and singing songs. Taiwanese fans have packed out the Tokyo Dome for all three of their games so far and even threatened to drown out home team supporters when their team played Japan on Friday. They blew trumpets, chanted for their favorite players and had their own cheerleading squad who dance on a stage during the game. The team struggled to match that exuberance on the field, with
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. The single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 400,000 and 800,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, saber-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. A single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 800,000 to 400,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, sabre-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Whether Japan would help defend Taiwan in case of a cross-strait conflict would depend on the US and the extent to which Japan would be allowed to act under the US-Japan Security Treaty, former Japanese minister of defense Satoshi Morimoto said. As China has not given up on the idea of invading Taiwan by force, to what extent Japan could support US military action would hinge on Washington’s intention and its negotiation with Tokyo, Morimoto said in an interview with the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) yesterday. There has to be sufficient mutual recognition of how Japan could provide
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