■ CRIME
Children deported to China
Two Chinese children detained at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport on Saturday for holding fake Taiwanese identification papers were deported to China yesterday, the National Immigration Agency said yesterday. The 16-year-old high school students, a boy and a girl, were caught with bogus passports, ID cards and boarding pass stamps, agency officials said. The officials said the children, who had arrived from Hong Kong, were caught while attempting to transfer to a flight to Guam, with the hope of later traveling to the US. Officials said they suspected that a human-trafficking ring was involved and were investigating the incident.
■ POLITICS
Contribution database opens
A Control Yuan database featuring information on contributions to politicians will open to the public today, staff said. In accordance with the Political Contribution Act (政治獻金法), which took effect in April 2004, the Control Yuan has kept documentation from all elections since then both of donors and how the contributions were spent. The public will be able to examine the records on two computers at the Control Yuan’s financial assets declaration department. The database contains information about individual and corporate donors and the sums of contributions to election hopefuls who opened special accounts to receive political donations.
■ RECREATION
Mayor promises penguins
Taichung Mayor Jason Hu (胡志強) pledged yesterday to open a penguin house — the nation’s largest — late this year or early next year. Construction on the facility, located within the city’s traditional fish market — which is scheduled to be refurbished — is expected to be finished in October at the earliest or early next year, Hu said. The Taichung City Government hopes both the penguin hall and the artificial wharf will become the city’s major tourist attractions. Once the penguin house is completed, it will host a variety of exhibits and research related to the bird, Hu said. Taichung plans to lease king penguins from the Taipei City Zoo, he said. “Taichung’s penguin house will be open before the next Lunar New Year,” he said, adding that within three years, the city’s penguin house hoped to showcase five or six species of penguin.
■ CULTURE
Agency plugs Yushan
The Construction and Planning Administration urged the public yesterday to vote for Yushan (玉山) on a Web site that is holding a contest for a new list of seven wonders of the natural world. The 3,952m Yushan — the nation’s highest peak — is the only site in the country that has been shortlisted in the online vote. A total of 261 natural heritage sites are on the New Seven Wonders Web site shortlist, agency officials said. The group that runs the Web site, the New7Wonders Foundation, will nominate 21 candidates out of 77 selected through a second stage of public voting on the Internet before July 7. Agency officials called on the public to take part in the vote at www.new7wonders.com or at a Web site run by the Yushan National Park Administration in conjunction with the New7Wonders Foundation. The officials said winning the vote for Yushan could help the nation increase its international visibility and attract tourists from abroad.
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
AMENDMENT: Contact with certain individuals in China, Hong Kong and Macau must be reported, and failure to comply could result in a prison sentence, the proposal stated The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) yesterday voted against a proposed bill by Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers that would require elected officials to seek approval before visiting China. DPP Legislator Puma Shen’s (沈伯洋) proposed amendments to 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), stipulate that contact with certain individuals in China, Hong Kong and Macau should be reported, while failure to comply would be punishable by prison sentences of up to three years, alongside a fine of NT$10 million (US$309,041). Fifty-six voted with the TPP in opposition
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