■ POLITICS
Dalai Lama hopes to visit
Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama would like to visit Taiwan again if given the opportunity, the Taipei-based Taiwan Tibet Exchange Foundation (TTEF) said yesterday. The Dalai Lama met and talked with members of a delegation from the foundation in Dharamsala, India, on Saturday, TTEF said in a press release. During the visit, the Dalai Lama also told TTEF board member Liu Shih-fang (劉世芳) and TTEF deputy secretary-general Own Su-jei (翁仕杰) he supported the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, the TTEF said. The Dalai Lama told Liu and Own that during his last visit to Taiwan in 2001, he saw many followers of Tibetan Buddhism and many of his own supporters, which he said made a very deep impression on him. “I’ve always thought about revisiting Taiwan over the past seven years, but there were always things coming up at the last minute,” he said.
■ ECONOMY
Ma coins miss the mark
Sales of commemorative coins marking the May 20 inauguration of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Vice President Vincent Siew (蕭萬長) fell well below expectations, central bank officials said on Saturday, citing high gold prices as the reason. The central bank invited the public to place orders for its set of gold and silver commemorative coins between May 16 and Friday. As of 5pm on Friday only 8,914 gold coins had been ordered. The central bank had expected to sell 50,000 gold coins at NT$32,000 each. Bank officials attributed the sluggish sales to the high price of gold. The price of gold has surged to US$900 per ounce, more than double the price three years ago, the officials said. The bank received orders for 45,839 silver coins at NT$1,500 each, but it had hoped to sell 100,000.
■ EDUCATION
Official going to APEC forum
Vice Minister of Education Lu Mu-lin (呂木琳) is scheduled to attend the fourth Education Ministerial Meeting of APEC in Peru on Wednesday and Thursday, where Lu will share Taiwan’s experiences with language education. Lu will participate in the meeting in Lima on behalf of Minister of Education Cheng Jei-cheng (鄭瑞城). Representatives for Taiwan and Chile are expected to give keynote speeches on language learning with the theme of “21st century competencies and skills for all.” The delegates are expected to discuss the nation’s initiatives in four areas: language learning; math and science; information technology and system reform; and career and technical education.
■ SOCIETY
Divorces, marriages down
Some 58,000 couples divorced last year, a drop of 6,000 couples from the previous year, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday. The ministry’s statistics showed that an average of around 160 couples divorced each day. Ministry officials ascribed the decrease to a drop in the number of marriages in the last four years. Couples married for fewer than five years accounted for 30.8 percent of those who divorced, followed by couples married for five to nine years at 26.3 percent. Among longer marriages the divorce rate was lower, but has grown over the past years. Over the past decade the divorce rate has increased 4.15 percent on average each year. The divorce rate among couples married for more than 30 years has grown the most, rising 11.89 percent over the last decade, followed by couples married between 25 and 29 years with a rise of 9.78 percent. The divorce rate among couples married between five and nine years increased by the third-largest rate, 4.56 percent.
An increase in Taiwanese boats using China-made automatic identification systems (AIS) could confuse coast guards patrolling waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast and become a loophole in the national security system, sources familiar with the matter said yesterday. Taiwan ADIZ, a Facebook page created by enthusiasts who monitor Chinese military activities in airspace and waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast, on Saturday identified what seemed to be a Chinese cargo container ship near Penghu County. The Coast Guard Administration went to the location after receiving the tip and found that it was a Taiwanese yacht, which had a Chinese AIS installed. Similar instances had also
GOOD DIPLOMACY: The KMT has maintained close contact with representative offices in Taiwan and had extended an invitation to Russia as well, the KMT said The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) would “appropriately handle” the fallout from an invitation it had extended to Russia’s representative to Taipei to attend its international banquet last month, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday. US and EU representatives in Taiwan boycotted the event, and only later agreed to attend after the KMT rescinded its invitation to the Russian representative. The KMT has maintained long-term close contact with all representative offices and embassies in Taiwan, and had extended the invitation as a practice of good diplomacy, Chu said. “Some EU countries have expressed their opinions of Russia, and the KMT respects that,” he
VIGILANCE: The military is paying close attention to actions that might damage peace and stability in the region, the deputy minister of national defense said The People’s Republic of China (PRC) might consider initiating a hack on Taiwanese networks on May 20, the day of the inauguration ceremony of president-elect William Lai (賴清德), sources familiar with cross-strait issues said. While US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s statement of the US expectation “that all sides will conduct themselves with restraint and prudence in the period ahead” would prevent military actions by China, Beijing could still try to sabotage Taiwan’s inauguration ceremony, the source said. China might gain access to the video screens outside of the Presidential Office Building and display embarrassing messages from Beijing, such as congratulating Lai
Four China Coast Guard ships briefly sailed through prohibited waters near Kinmen County, Taipei said, urging Beijing to stop actions that endanger navigation safety. The Chinese ships entered waters south of Kinmen, 5km from the Chinese city of Xiamen, at about 3:30pm on Monday, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement later the same day. The ships “sailed out of our prohibited and restricted waters” about an hour later, the agency said, urging Beijing to immediately stop “behavior that endangers navigation safety.” Ministry of National Defense spokesman Sun Li-fang (孫立方) yesterday told reporters that Taiwan would boost support to the Coast Guard