■ CRIME
Man fined for eating dog
A man in Tainan was fined NT$50,000 on Tuesday for killing and eating his pet dog. The man in his seventies was identified by the surname Su. Neighbors reported to police last week that he had slaughtered his own dog and shared the cooked meat with his family. Investigators from the Tainan City Animal Health Inspection and Quarantine Institute questioned Su, who admitted that he killed the dog on the grounds that the pet was in heat and "too noisy." The man, who was described as "remorseful," received the minimum fine of NT$50,000 and was warned not to commit the same offense again. According to the Animal Protection Law (動物保護法), anyone who kills a dog can be fined betweeen NT$50,000 and NT$250,000.
■ SOCIETY
Taiwan Pride set for Oct. 13
The lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) communities announced yesterday they will stage the fifth annual Taiwan Pride parade in October. The parade is organized by the Taiwan Pride Community, with collaboration from several LGBT and gender-sexuality rights groups, a Taiwan Pride Community news release said. According to the estimate by Taiwan Pride Community, around 10 percent of the population belongs to LGBT communities, "however, these communities are still treated unfairly and are constantly discriminated against in society," the news release said. LGBT citizens hope to "extend friendly hands to interact and have dialogue with non-LGBT people ... to overturn the negative stereotypes ," it said. The parade is scheduled to begin at 1:30pm in front of the Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall on Saturday, Oct. 13.
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