■POLITICS
Lien leads think tank to PRC
Former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman Lien Chan (連戰) will lead a delegation of members of the party’s think tank to the KMT-Chinese Communist Party (CCP) forum in China in December, KMT Chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) said yesterday. Lien will head the delegation as the chairman of the National Policy Foundation, the KMT’s think tank, and discuss economic issues with CCP think tank members, Wu told a media gathering at KMT headquarters in Taipei. The KMT-CCP forum was created in April 2005 when Lien visited China. The forum serves as a platform for the two parties to discuss cross-strait issues. Wu, who underwent an arterial stent implant last week because of coronary heart disease, said he had already visited China twice this year and met with Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) and that he had no further plans to visit China this year.
■CULTURE
Festive reopening planned
Part of Anhe Road in Taipei City will be closed to traffic tomorrow amid activities marking the reopening of Eslite bookstore’s flagship outlet on Dunhua S Road. Taipei City’s Information and Tourism Department will promote the distinct culture of the city’s eastern district with music performances and outdoor movie screenings starting at 2pm in front of the bookstore. Wang Shih-chia (王施佳), a division chief at the department, said the bookstore has become one of the city’s most popular attractions and cultural landmarks for many foreign tourists. Wang said the department will be offering free coffee and popcorn. German director Wim Wenders’ movie Lisbon Story will be screened at 7pm.
■TOURISM
Hualien hotels fully booked
Most hotel owners in the Hualien area said their rooms are fully booked from today through Sunday, the three-day weekend that begins with Double Ten celebrations today. They said that even private tourist accommodation in the city and county were fully booked for the weekend, mainly because of the Double Ten gala night festivities at Hualien Stadium tonight. The hotel owners said all train tickets to and from Hualien until Sunday have been sold out, leaving many of their guests without transportation to go to Hualien or return home. Entry to the Double Ten festivities is free. The public can enter the stadium from 4:30pm. The lineup of performers includes television program hosts, well-known singers and dancers, as well as traditional dancing and singing by Aboriginal tribes from Hualien.
■HEALTH
Dengue patient rewarded
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday announced an imported case of dengue fever that had been reported to the CDC by the patient himself. The man came down with fever and joint and muscle pain soon after his return from a trip to Vietnam last Friday, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ting (林頂) said. Suspecting that he may have contracted dengue fever, the man informed the CDC of his symptoms through the CDC’s online self-notification system on Tuesday. Tests confirmed that he did have dengue fever, Lin said. The man will be awarded NT$2,500 as part of the center’s measures to encourage people to report infectious disease cases, the CDC said. CDC statistics show that 375 cases of dengue fever have been recorded in the country so far this year, 209 of which were indigenous cases and 166 imported. Of the total number of cases, 185 occurred since the start of the summer.
■DIPLOMACY
MOFA aids Paraguay, Haiti
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday said that last month Taiwan donated US$201,000 to the Paraguayan government and a local charity to help with drought relief in the country’s northern region. Diego Chou (周麟), the deputy chief of the Department of Central and South American affairs, said the money would be used to purchase supplies for the Gran Chaco region, which has been hit with a cyclical drought in the last six months. An estimated 60 percent of the population in the area live below the poverty line and their livelihoods are quickly deteriorating because of the extended drought. The ministry said that Taiwan would also donate 800 tonnes of rice to Haiti this month.
■CULTURE
Hakka group offers awards
The Council for Hakka Affairs has started soliciting applications for next year’s Hakka Contributions Awards that honor those who promote Hakka culture. Local residents and foreigners are welcome to submit applications for the awards. There are no restrictions based on ethnic group or gender, a statement released by the council said on Wednesday. There are two categories of awards: the Award for Outstanding Contributions to Hakkas and the Award for Lifetime Contributions to Hakkas. Applicants for the life-time contributions award must be recommended by other individuals or nominated by groups. A maximum of two winners will be selected annually and each will receive a prize of NT$1 million (US$30,810). Applicants for the outstanding contributions award must be under the age of 35 and are encouraged to recommend themselves. The submission period will run through Nov. 30.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching