Taichung Mayor Jason Hu (胡志強) was the best candidate to visit the Marshall Islands on behalf of the government, Ministry of Foreign Affairs Spokesman Henry Chen (陳銘政) said yesterday after the pan-green camp called Hu the “runaway mayor” for being away when the city was struck by Typhoon Fung-wong last week.
Chen said Hu was the foreign minister when Taiwan and the Marshall Islands established diplomatic relations in 1998 and many residents of the Pacific island country have a strong affection and deep gratitude for Hu.
“The ministry should thank him for cementing bilateral ties between the two countries,” Chen said.
Chen said Hu had been invited by Marshallese Foreign Minister Tony deBrun to preside over a donation handover ceremony.
Hu has also come under fire over a trip to Switzerland at the end of April, with critics saying that he went there on holiday and not official business.
Deputy Mayor of Taichung, Hsiao Chia-chi (蕭家旗) said in Hu’s defense that he went to Switzerland to meet with the International Baseball Federation (IBAF) to seek the right to host the 13th Youth World Baseball Championship (YWBC) and to meet with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to lobby on having baseball re-instated as an official Olympic sport.
However, some of Hu’s critics who are familiar with such matters, said the IOC headquarters deals with basic administrative matters and not issues such as lobbying and that Hu did not need to go to Switzerland because Taiwan’s IOC member Wu Ching-kuo (吳經國) has an office in Taipei.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY CHIANG CHING-YA
The Ministry of Education (MOE) is to launch a new program to encourage international students to stay in Taiwan and explore job opportunities here after graduation, Deputy Minister of Education Yeh Ping-cheng (葉丙成) said on Friday. The government would provide full scholarships for international students to further their studies for two years in Taiwan, so those who want to pursue a master’s degree can consider applying for the program, he said. The fields included are science, technology, engineering, mathematics, semiconductors and finance, Yeh added. The program, called “Intense 2+2,” would also assist international students who completed the two years of further studies in
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
Taiwan will now have four additional national holidays after the Legislative Yuan passed an amendment today, which also made Labor Day a national holiday for all sectors. The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) used their majority in the Legislative Yuan to pass the amendment to the Act on Implementing Memorial Days and State Holidays (紀念日及節日實施辦法), which the parties jointly proposed, in its third and final reading today. The legislature passed the bill to amend the act, which is currently enforced administratively, raising it to the legal level. The new legislation recognizes Confucius’ birthday on Sept. 28, the
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
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