■ SOCIETY
Nurse commits suicide
A nurse at Chang Gung Memorial Hospital in Keelung succumbed to the pressure of mounting credit card debts and committed suicide on Friday, police said yesterday. Tsai Yu-ting (蔡玉婷) died by draining her own blood, they said. Her younger sister found her body in bed with a blood transfusion pipe and a bucket full of blood at her side. Tsai said in a suicide note that when her father, a fishing boat owner, ran up heavy debts several years ago, she borrowed large sums of money from a bank to help him, but did not tell him where the money came from. After years of struggling to pay the debts with her limited salary at the hospital, she ended her life to settle the debts once and for all, the note said. Police said statistics show that on average, 40 people committed suicide every month because of heavy credit card debts between 2006 and last year.
■POLITICS
DPP pans Ma over index dip
The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus said yesterday the stock market’s 5 percent, or 460.67 points, drop last week was a reflection of the public’s lack of confidence in President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) policies and capabilities. “The TAIEX dropped approximately 5 percent within the past five business days. An estimated NT$1.17 trillion [US$39 billion] vaporized just like that. Although economics was a major issue in Ma’s campaign [for office], it is obvious that he has failed to convince the public in that regard,” a press release by the DPP caucus read. As the central government plans to raise gas and utilities prices, the caucus warned that the situation could go from bad to worse and the TAIEX could continue to decline, reflecting investors’ disappointment with and lack of confidence in the new government.
■CULTURE
Confucius camp in August
Local and foreign youths, aged 15 to 17, are invited to participate in the annual Confucius rite of passage camp hosted by Tainan City Government, the Taiwan Economic and Cultural Representative Office (TECRO) said yesterday. The camp aims to help young people learn more about the values of gratitude, responsibility and independence, TECRO said. All participants will receive a certificate of completion at the end of the camp, which will run from Aug. 2 to Aug. 7. The entire camp will be conducted in Mandarin and participants would be responsible for their own transportation. Registration ends on July 15. Application forms can be downloaded from the TECRO cultural division Web site at www.moetwdc.org/English/index.html.
■ARTS
Sculptors in German show
Two award-winning Taiwanese woodcarving artists have been invited to demonstrate their creative skills at a workshop held alongside the 2008 International Woodsculptor Symposium in Annaberg-Buchholz, a town in the Free State of Saxony in Germany, from June 14 to June 21. Chen De-Lung (陳德隆) and Tseng An-kuo (曾安國), who both have their own studios in Sanyi (三義) — a small town in Miaoli County renowned for its woodcarving industry — will compete with 23 other wood sculptors from Germany and six other countries in the creative camp called “Wood Sculptors Create Great Works.” Chen’s specialty is carving historical figures, animals and insects, while Tseng is an expert in carving Buddha statues, orchid flowers and female figures. Both of them have won numerous awards in domestic competitions since 1992.
The disruption of 941 flights in and out of Taiwan due to China’s large-scale military exercises was no accident, but rather the result of a “quasi-blockade” used to simulate creating the air and sea routes needed for an amphibious landing, a military expert said. The disruptions occurred on Tuesday and lasted about 10 hours as China conducted live-fire drills in the Taiwan Strait. The Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) said the exercises affected 857 international flights and 84 domestic flights, affecting more than 100,000 travelers. Su Tzu-yun (蘇紫雲), a research fellow at the government-sponsored Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said the air
Taiwan is to commence mass production of the Tien Kung (天弓, “Sky Bow”) III, IV and V missiles by the second quarter of this year if the legislature approves the government’s NT$1.25 trillion (US$39.78 billion) special defense budget, an official said yesterday. Commenting on condition of anonymity, a defense official with knowledge of the matter said that the advanced systems are expected to provide crucial capabilities against ballistic and cruise missiles for the proposed “T-Dome,” an advanced, multi-layered air defense network. The Tien Kung III is an air defense missile with a maximum interception altitude of 35km. The Tien Kung IV and V
Trips for more than 100,000 international and domestic air travelers could be disrupted as China launches a military exercise around Taiwan today, Taiwan’s Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) said yesterday. The exercise could affect nearly 900 flights scheduled to enter the Taipei Flight Information Region (FIR) during the exercise window, it added. A notice issued by the Chinese Civil Aviation Administration showed there would be seven temporary zones around the Taiwan Strait which would be used for live-fire exercises, lasting from 8am to 6pm today. All aircraft are prohibited from entering during exercise, it says. Taipei FIR has 14 international air routes and
Taiwan lacks effective and cost-efficient armaments to intercept rockets, making the planned “T-Dome” interception system necessary, two experts said on Tuesday. The concerns were raised after China’s military fired two waves of rockets during live-fire drills around Taiwan on Tuesday, part of two-day exercises code-named “Justice Mission 2025.” The first wave involved 17 rockets launched at 9am from Pingtan in China’s Fujian Province, according to Lieutenant General Hsieh Jih-sheng (謝日升) of the Office of the Deputy Chief of the General Staff for Intelligence at the Ministry of National Defense. Those rockets landed 70 nautical miles (129.6km) northeast of Keelung without flying over Taiwan,
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