■ SOCIETY
Chess tournament begins
The 2007 World Computer Chinese Chess Championship will begin today at two universities in Tainan, the organizers of the event said yesterday. The three-day competition is being jointly organized by Chang-Jung Christian University, National University of Tainan and the Taiwanese Association for Artificial Intelligence. It will be divided into two sections with 15 teams from the US, France, China and Taiwan competing in Group A using self-developed computer programs, a spokesman said. In Group B, nearly 100 members of the public from Taiwan and China will play against computers. The winners from each section will challenge Taiwan's best Chinese chess player, Wu Kuei-lin (吳貴臨). The event also includes a forum in which academics from Taiwan and Japan are invited to discuss issues concerning computer Chinese chess, the spokesman said.
■ HEALTH
Dengue fever alarm sounded
A 68-year-old woman in Tainan contracted the first case of indigenous dengue hemorrhagic fever this year, the Center of Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday. Dengue hemorrhagic fever is a more serious form of the disease that can often prove fatal. The woman fell ill last Wednesday, and was reported as a possible dengue case on the same day, the CDC said. Residents of Tainan and surrounding areas are urged to be vigilant about clearing up puddles of water where the mosquito that spreads the disease can breed, especially given the rainy weather in recent days. "The alarm needs to be sounded for the Tainan area," CDC deputy director Chou Chih-hao (周志浩) said.
■ BUSINESS
TTLC wins 42 quality medals
The Taiwan Tobacco and Liquor Corp (TTLC) announced yesterday that it won 42 quality medals at this year's world quality selections for wine and food products organized by Monde Selection in Barcelona, Spain. The medals brought home by TTLC include the International Quality Trophy, which was awarded to five beer products made by the state-owned company. The company's victory in the world contest is the culmination of its successful improvements to its wine and tobacco products, and will sharpen its competitiveness in international markets, the spokesman said. Monde Selection is an international institute for quality selections founded in 1961 and is the most representative and oldest organization in the field of quality selections worldwide.
■ CRIME
Bogus officials arrested
The Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB) announced on Thursday that it had arrested two men who disguised themselves as national security officials in an attempt to pressure government agencies to prolong their rights to exploit a mine in Kaohsiung. The two suspects, Chen Hsing-hung (陳信宏) and Chen Kuo-hui (陳國輝), were detained by CIB agents after their true identities were discovered by the National Security Bureau on information provided by Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) officials. The pair admitted to having disguised themselves as security officials and using false name cards during a meeting with the EPA secretary-general, during which they tried to pressure EPA personnel to agree to extend their mining rights. The two men claimed that they are shareholders of a mining company registered in Kaohsiung County, and pressured officials to allow the company to continue operations.
■ CRIME
Man tried for trafficking
A Taiwanese man is set to go on trial in Vietnam this month charged with trafficking Vietnamese women in Malaysia, Vietnamese state media said yesterday. Tsai Hsien, 46, is to go on trial with five Vietnamese, including his wife, in Ho Chi Minh City on July 26, the Vietnam News Agency said. Investigators in Vietnam said they had evidence that the group had arranged fake marriages for more than 100 women, but then forced the women to remarry or work as prostitutes after coming to Malaysia. They said the women were sold for between US$1,500 and US$2,000 each. If found guilty, Tsai faces up to 20 years in jail.
■ PUBLIC SAFETY
EPA to limit chemical use
The Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) will soon limit the use of nonylphenol chemicals (NPs) in all food stuffs, wax and detergents, setting a ceiling concentration of 0.1 percent, EPA officials said yesterday. The new regulation, which should come into effect in September, was announced amid increasing concerns over the health hazards posed by NPs, they said. Officials revealed that the EPA is also discussing the possibility of declaring NPs and nonylphenol ethoxylates -- compounds made from NPs -- hazardous materials, in the hope that this classification would facilitate further restrictions on the use of NPs. The chemical structure of NPs is very similar to that of estrogen, they noted, and male animals that ingest such chemicals after they are discharged into the environment have proven susceptible to reproductive difficulties, growth retardation and hormonal disruption. The chemicals have also been implicated in a number of human health issues, including infertility and breast cancer. In a survey by National Taiwan University, researchers collected 75 common cleaners and found that 66 percent of them contain NPs or NP-related chemicals.
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
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
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