Statistics from the Ministry of Transportation and Communications (MOTC) showed yesterday that a total of 1,718 people died in traffic accidents between January and October this year, a decrease of 6 percent compared with the same period last year.
The number of injured passengers, meanwhile, rose by 5.7 percent to 195,656.
The ministry periodically conducts statistical analyses of traffic accidents to gauge the effectiveness of efforts to improve road safety.
Aside from the total number of deaths in a given time period, the ministry divides accidents causing passengers deaths into categories A1 and A2. Accidents listed in the A1 category are those leading to the death of passengers on the spot or within 24 hours, whereas those in the A2 category caused death after 24 hours.
The ministry focuses more on the accidents in the A1 category.
The ministry also examined the causes of A1 traffic accidents occurring from January to October. Statistics showed that motor scooter riders caused 727 traffic accidents, which accounted for 44 percent of all A1 accidents. They were followed by drivers of small passenger vehicles, who were to blame for 27.4 percent of all A1 accidents.
They were also the top two causes of A1 traffic accidents in 2007.
When analyzing the death of passengers by the kind of vehicles they were operating, those riding motorcycles were most vulnerable in traffic accidents.
Approximately 1,360 motorscooter riders died in A1 category accidents.
About 22 percent of the victims in the A1 category accidents were aged 70 or above, the most in any age group. They were followed by those aged between 25 and 34, who accounted for approximately 15 percent.
Taiwanese can file complaints with the Tourism Administration to report travel agencies if their activities caused termination of a person’s citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday, after a podcaster highlighted a case in which a person’s citizenship was canceled for receiving a single-use Chinese passport to enter Russia. The council is aware of incidents in which people who signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of Russia were told they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, Chiu told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Taipei. However, the travel agencies actually applied
Japanese footwear brand Onitsuka Tiger today issued a public apology and said it has suspended an employee amid allegations that the staff member discriminated against a Vietnamese customer at its Taipei 101 store. Posting on the social media platform Threads yesterday, a user said that an employee at the store said that “those shoes are very expensive” when her friend, who is a migrant worker from Vietnam, asked for assistance. The employee then ignored her until she asked again, to which she replied: "We don't have a size 37." The post had amassed nearly 26,000 likes and 916 comments as of this
New measures aimed at making Taiwan more attractive to foreign professionals came into effect this month, the National Development Council said yesterday. Among the changes, international students at Taiwanese universities would be able to work in Taiwan without a work permit in the two years after they graduate, explainer materials provided by the council said. In addition, foreign nationals who graduated from one of the world’s top 200 universities within the past five years can also apply for a two-year open work permit. Previously, those graduates would have needed to apply for a work permit using point-based criteria or have a Taiwanese company
The Shilin District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday indicted two Taiwanese and issued a wanted notice for Pete Liu (劉作虎), founder of Shenzhen-based smartphone manufacturer OnePlus Technology Co (萬普拉斯科技), for allegedly contravening 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) by poaching 70 engineers in Taiwan. Liu allegedly traveled to Taiwan at the end of 2014 and met with a Taiwanese man surnamed Lin (林) to discuss establishing a mobile software research and development (R&D) team in Taiwan, prosecutors said. Without approval from the government, Lin, following Liu’s instructions, recruited more than 70 software
RSS