■DIPLOMACY
Burghardt concludes visit
American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) chairman Raymond Burghardt returned to the US yesterday, concluding his four-day visit to Taipei to brief Taiwanese officials and opposition leaders on US President Barack Obama’s recent visit to China. Burghardt arrived in Taiwan on Sunday, only days after a joint statement was issued by Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) in Beijing. The trip was aimed at clearing the air on Taiwan’s place in US-China-Taiwan relations and explaining the US government’s views on a number of other issues, including its economic agenda, US arms sales to Taiwan and the controversy surrounding Taiwan’s relaxation of its regulations on US beef imports.
■CULTURE
Foundation set to sign MOU
The Memorial Foundation of 228 and Taipei City Government are set to sign a memorandum of understanding today to cooperate on projects with the city’s 228 Memorial Museum. Foundation chief executive officer Liao Chi-pin (廖繼斌) said the foundation plans to open its national 228 memorial museum in 2011. The museum will be located on Nanhai Road where the American Institute in Taiwan’s culture and information section used to stand. Since the city’s 228 Memorial Museum was established in 1997, Liao said they have more display items than the national 228 museum, but the national museum’s advantage is that it has more comprehensive archives than the municipal one. “Basically, we want the exhibitions held by the two museums not to repeat or overlap with each other,” he said. “We also want to share our resources ... families of victims do not care whether the museum is national or municipal.”
■CRIME
Baggage handlers nabbed
Three baggage handlers at the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport were arrested for stealing cash and other valuables from passengers’ luggage, airport police said yesterday. “Three baggage handlers have been detained for stealing a wallet containing ¥20,000 (US$400) from a Japanese passenger’s checked-in luggage. We are investigating if more baggage handlers are involved,” airport police told reporters. The Japanese man flew from Taiwan to Okinawa on Nov. 18. When he retrieved his luggage upon arrival, he saw that it had been opened and the wallet was missing, so he asked Okinawa officials to inform Taiwanese authorities. During questioning on Tuesday, three baggage handlers confessed to stealing from luggage for about two years, a Taoyuan airport police officer who requested anonymity said. “They stole valuables while loading luggage inside the airplane’s cargo hold, as there is no security camera there,” he said.
■CULTURE
Flower exhibition to open
The Shihlin Official Residence Chrysanthemum Exhibition opens on Saturday and will feature about 100 kinds of chrysanthemum, including 22 kinds being shown at the annual exhibition for the first time, Taipei City’s Parks and Street Lights Office said. The exhibition will also feature a number of special activities on weekends including chrysanthemum painting shows, saxophone performances and hand puppet shows. To mark next year’s Taipei International Flora Expo , the exhibition will feature nine zones displaying 55,000 pots of chrysanthemum, the office said. The exhibition is open from 8am to 7pm and runs until Dec. 13. For more information visit www.2009chshow.com.tw.
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
BREACH OF CONTRACT: The bus operators would seek compensation and have demanded that the manufacturer replace the chips with ones that meet regulations Two bus operators found to be using buses with China-made chips are to demand that the original manufacturers replace the systems and provide compensation for breach of contract, the Veterans Affairs Council said yesterday. Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Michelle Lin (林楚茵) yesterday said that Da Nan Bus Co and Shin-Shin Bus Co Ltd have fielded a total of 82 buses that are using Chinese chips. The bus models were made by Tron-E, while the systems provider was CYE Electronics, Lin said. Lin alleged that the buses were using chips manufactured by Huawei subsidiary HiSilicon Co, which presents a national security risk if the
The National Immigration Agency has banned two Chinese from returning to Taiwan, after they published social media content it described as disrespectful to national sovereignty. The agency imposed a two-month ban on a Chinese man surnamed Liang (梁) and a permanent ban on a woman surnamed Yang (楊), an influencer with 23 million followers, in October last year and last week respectively. Minister of the Interior Liu Shyh-fang (劉世芳) yesterday said on the sidelines of a legislative meeting that Chinese visitors to Taiwan are required to comply with the rules and regulations governing their entry permits. The government has handled the ban and
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