■ DIPLOMACY
Ma sends congratulations
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) sent a message to Panamanian president-elect Ricardo Martinelli after Martinelli won the country’s election on Sunday, while Ambassador to Panama Simon Ko (柯森耀) said he believed Martinelli’s election would not lead to major changes in bilateral relations. An embassy official who spoke on condition of anonymity said Ma delivered his congratulations and expressed willingness to continue promoting relations between the two countries after Martinelli’s inauguration. The official said Ma faxed his congratulatory letter to the embassy and instructed that it be hand-delivered to the president-elect.
■ POLITICS
Chen applies to DPP
The Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) Taipei City branch said yesterday it had received former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) application for membership and the party would convene a meeting today to review it in accordance with regulations. Taipei branch director Huang Ching-lin (黃慶林) said if Chen’s application passed a preliminary review, it would be submitted to the party’s Central Standing Committee for approval. Huang said it would be good for Chen to return to the fold and would hopefully help unify the party. Huang visited Chen at the Taipei Detention Center yesterday.
■ POLITICS
KMT mulls 'clean' rules
The Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) Clean Government Committee (CGC) yesterday suggested the party not nominate anyone for elections who has been sentenced to one year in prison or longer at a first trial. In response, KMT Secretary-General Wu Den-yi (吳敦義) said the party would take the suggestion seriously. Wu said during an interview at the legislature that since the KMT had won the presidency, the public has held KMT officials to higher standards, adding that President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and KMT Chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) were very self-disciplined. If the committee’s suggestion is in the public’s interest, the KMT cannot turn a deaf ear, he said. But KMT Legislator Fu Kun-chi (傅崑萁) criticized the suggestion. Fu, who was sentenced to four years and six months at a first trial in an insider trading case, said the committee did not have authority over the party’s charter. When asked whether he would still seek the party’s nomination for Hualien County commissioner, Fu said: “People in Hualien know clearly I am resolved to serve the people.”
■ TRANSPORTATION
Taichung offers free buses
Taichung City Mayor Jason Hu (胡志強) said yesterday that the city would launch a free public bus program from May 18 as part of efforts to cut carbon dioxide emissions. During a six-month period that will run through Nov. 17, those carrying “Taiwan Easy Go” cards will be able to ride public buses in downtown Taichung free of charge from 7am to 9am and 5pm to 7pm, Monday to Friday. The city government hopes the initiative will encourage more people to take the bus, Hu said, adding that his goal was to see an increase in passenger volume to at least 3 million per month within the next three years. In early 2002, passenger volume was 300,000 per month, he said. The number has increased to 2.1 million thanks to the incentive programs introduced by the city government, he said. Some NT$250 million (US$7.58 million) has been allocated for the new program, he said.
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