■ AVIATION
US measures extended
The US has extended an emergency amendment on flight security inspections until Monday, the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) said. The emergency amendment, issued by the US Transportation Security Administration (TSA), asked all passengers traveling to the US to have their carry-on luggage rechecked at boarding gates. The CAA said last week that the tightened security measures would apply to passengers traveling between Dec. 25 and Dec. 30. However, the TSA informed the CAA on Thursday morning the new inspection requirement would be in place until Monday. The inspection will focus on liquids, gels and aerosol sprays, the CAA said, urging passengers to contact airlines directly if they had doubts about the new flight safety requirements.
■ SPORTS
NT$2bn pledged to baseball
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said on Thursday that the government would invest more than NT$2 billion (US$62.6 million) over the next four years to revitalize local baseball. The endeavors will include reforming the baseball competition system, increasing the number of players and providing incentives for students to take up the sport, Ma said, adding that the government will mobilize all available resources to ensure that “2010, the first year of a baseball revival,” is “not a mere slogan.” Ma said schools should improve the ways in which physical education is provided so that students “know more than just how to play ball.” He said he hoped that the sport would not be ruined by game-rigging scandals.
■ ELECTIONS
DPP mulls Kaohsiung race
The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said it would name its candidate for the mayoral election of the new special municipality to be formed by the merger of Kaohsiung City and County by late March. DPP Secretary-General Su Jia-chyuan (蘇嘉全) said the party’s Central Standing Committee would complete its nomination process next month or by the end of March and he hoped that “it will be a peaceful competition.” Incumbent Kaohsiung County Commissioner Yang Chiu-hsing (楊秋興) and Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chu (陳菊), both of whom enjoy high approval ratings, have shown a keen interest in vying for the post in an election to be held in December. Chen urged the committee to field an eligible candidate who could meet voters’ expectations and stressed that the candidate’s selection must not cause a split within the party.
■ HEALTH
Exercise rate creeps up
A recent survey conducted by the Sports Affairs Council showed that 24.4 percent of the population regularly exercised three times a week for at least 30 minutes at a time last year, an increase of 0.2 percentage points from 2008. The results of the council’s survey on the exercise habits of people in the nation’s 25 cities and counties showed that walking was the most popular exercise, performed by 31.7 percent of respondents, followed by hiking (21.9 percent), cycling (21.1 percent) and basketball (18.9 percent). The annual poll has identified walking as the nation’s most popular form of exercise for three years straight. Hiking rose to second from fifth a year before, while jogging fell to fifth from second place, officials said. The survey was based on 25,518 valid responses from all 25 cities and counties, including Kinmen and Matsu. Council official Wu Lung-shan (吳龍山) said the council would allocate NT$1.6 billion (US$50 million) over the next four years to popularize exercising.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods