■ POLITICS
Hsieh Wen-ting appointed
Hsieh Wen-ting (謝文定), a head prosecutor with the Supreme Prosecutors Office, will serve as the new secretary-general of the Judicial Yuan, sources said on Sunday. President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) had nominated Hsieh to serve as state public prosecutor-general, but the legislative vetoed the nomination. The source said Judicial Yuan President Lai In-jaw (賴英照), who assumed office yesterday, had invited Hsieh to serve as chief of staff. Hsieh said he had accepted Lai's invitation. A changeover ceremony for the Judicial Yuan president and vice president was to be held yesterday morning. Lai will replace Weng Yueh-sheng (翁岳生), who is retiring. Hsieh Tsay-chuan (謝在全) will be sworn in as Judicial Yuan vice president.
■ CULTURE
Museum holds birthday sale
The National Palace Museum will open a three-day sale on Friday on a wide range of publications,reproductions and souvenirs in celebration of its 81st anniversary, a spokesman said yesterday. The annual sale -- held in the museum's Library Building -- will include reproductions of paintings and calligraphic works from the Sung, Yuan, Ming and Ching dynasties. Other items include illustrated catalogues of rare paintings and calligraphy from the Sung dynasty, catalogs of ceramic ware from government-owned kilns in the imperial dynasties and catalogs of costumes of the Ching dynasty. Other items, including silk scarves, vases, mugs, lacquer boxes, neckties and inkstones, will also be on sale.
■ ENVIRONMENT
Review committee sparks ire
The Environmental Protection Administration's (EPA) Environmental Impact Review Committee yesterday voted to form a special taskforce to review construction of a Formosa Plastics steel plant in Yunlin. EPA Minister Winston Dang (陳重信), however, ruled toward the end of the meeting that the conclusion was still pending, since some of the committee members questioned the validity of the voting process. Other members also questioned Formosa's ability to fulfill the promises it had made during the review. The committee had previously determined that the case should be reviewed in the next evaluation phase, in which the developer will be asked to submit a more detailed environmental impact report. The result enraged environmentalists and local representatives at yesterday's committee meeting. They accused the EPA of rubber-stamping development projects. Liou Ming-lung (劉銘龍), chairman of the Environmental Quality Protection Foundation, said he and other activists would seek the support of lawmakers to question the EPA over the matter during this legislative session.
■ TECHNOLOGY
`Sugar chips' touted
Researchers at Academia Sinica have completed the development of a new "sugar chip" that can diagnose cancerous cells and bacterial or viral infections within seconds with high accuracy, sources said yesterday. The chips, based on glycan micro-array technology, detect specific interactions between carbohydrates and proteins to determine the onset of known diseases, academics said. The team at the Genomics Research Center will next use the chip to try to detect HIV and avian influenza. Liang Pi-hui (梁碧惠), a post-doctoral researcher at the center, said the chip only required a small sample and just seconds to produce results with nearly 100 percent accuracy.
Taiwanese can file complaints with the Tourism Administration to report travel agencies if their activities caused termination of a person’s citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday, after a podcaster highlighted a case in which a person’s citizenship was canceled for receiving a single-use Chinese passport to enter Russia. The council is aware of incidents in which people who signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of Russia were told they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, Chiu told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Taipei. However, the travel agencies actually applied
New measures aimed at making Taiwan more attractive to foreign professionals came into effect this month, the National Development Council said yesterday. Among the changes, international students at Taiwanese universities would be able to work in Taiwan without a work permit in the two years after they graduate, explainer materials provided by the council said. In addition, foreign nationals who graduated from one of the world’s top 200 universities within the past five years can also apply for a two-year open work permit. Previously, those graduates would have needed to apply for a work permit using point-based criteria or have a Taiwanese company
The Shilin District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday indicted two Taiwanese and issued a wanted notice for Pete Liu (劉作虎), founder of Shenzhen-based smartphone manufacturer OnePlus Technology Co (萬普拉斯科技), for allegedly contravening the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例) by poaching 70 engineers in Taiwan. Liu allegedly traveled to Taiwan at the end of 2014 and met with a Taiwanese man surnamed Lin (林) to discuss establishing a mobile software research and development (R&D) team in Taiwan, prosecutors said. Without approval from the government, Lin, following Liu’s instructions, recruited more than 70 software
Taiwanese singer Jay Chou (周杰倫) plans to take to the courts of the Australian Open for the first time as a competitor in the high-stakes 1 Point Slam. The Australian Open yesterday afternoon announced the news on its official Instagram account, welcoming Chou — who celebrates his 47th birthday on Sunday — to the star-studded lineup of the tournament’s signature warm-up event. “From being the King of Mandarin Pop filling stadiums with his music to being Kato from The Green Hornet and now shifting focus to being a dedicated tennis player — welcome @jaychou to the 1 Point Slam and #AusOpen,” the
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