■ENVIRONMENT
Mild quake sways south
A magnitude 4.6 earthquake struck southern Taiwan at about 2am yesterday, the Central Weather Bureau’s Seismology Center reported. The quake was felt in most of southern Taiwan, but did not cause any damage or casualties, authorities said. It was centered 12.7km southwest of the Jiasian (甲仙) seismology observation station in Kaohsiung County at a depth of 19.2km, said Kuo Kai-wen (郭鎧紋), head of the center.
■CRIME
Hualien judge impeached
The Control Yuan yesterday impeached a Taiwan High Court Hualien Branch judge for visiting the home of a suspect in a corruption case in which he served as the judge. The Control Yuan referred Judge Lin Teh-sheng (林德盛) to the Commission on the Disciplinary Sanctions of Public Functionaries for disciplinary measures. Lin was accused of visiting the home of former Taitung County commissioner Wu Chun-li (吳俊立), who was charged with corruption while serving as a Taitung County councilor in 1999. Lin was suspected of accepting benefits from Wu in exchange for influencing the outcome of the judicial review in Wu’s favor.
■CRIME
Taiwan seeks extradition
The government is seeking the extradition from China of an airline passenger who claimed to have a bomb in his luggage during a flight bound for Shanghai, a Ministry of Justice official said yesterday. “We’ve already presented our request to [China] to bring back the man,” the official said. The request was based on an agreement forged by Taipei and Beijing on cooperation in the fight against crime, the official said, but declined to reveal the background of the man and the charges he may face. Local media said the passenger, identified as George Lin, holds both a US passport and a Taiwanese ID. He claimed there were explosives in his luggage on China Airlines Flight CI501 from Taipei on Saturday, leading pilots to divert the plane to Hangzhou, the Central News Agency (CNA) said. The plane with 293 passengers on board landed safely in Hangzhou and no one was injured in the incident. Lin was taken away by Chinese police for questioning, CNA said.
■CULTURE
Local belly dancer wins
Belly dancer Sun Yu-ting (孫于婷) has won first place in the solo category of the World Belly Dance Competition in Seoul, sharing the title with a South Korean dancer. Sun was presented with a championship trophy on Sunday, a day after the competition ended, amid some controversy over her final position in the contest. Sun tied with the South Korean competitor for the highest score, but was not named the top winner. After a protest by Tzeng Niou-lang (曾紐朗), leader of the Taiwanese team and head of the Taiwanese Dance and Sport Federation, the organizers of the competition agreed to present a winner’s trophy to Sun. However, they did not allow her to share the cash prize of US$3,000, saying the South Korean competitor had outshone Sun in the areas of dance skills and costume. The biennial competition in South Korea is one of the four major belly dance contests in the world, second only to an annual contest that is usually held in Cairo in June, Tzeng said. Twenty professional and amateur Taiwanese dancers, aged nine to 63, took part in this year’s competition. Several other members won various prizes.
FAST TRACK? Chinese spouses must renounce their Chinese citizenship and pledge allegiance to Taiwan to gain citizenship, some demonstrators said Opponents and supporters of a bill that would allow Chinese spouses to obtain Taiwanese citizenship in four years instead of six staged protests near the Legislative Yuan in Taipei yesterday morning. Those who oppose the bill proposed by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) demanded that Chinese spouses be granted citizenship only after renouncing their Chinese citizenship, passing a citizenship test and pledging allegiance to Taiwan. The demonstrators, who were protesting at a side entrance to the Legislative Yuan on Jinan Road, were mostly members of the Taiwan Association of University Professors and other organizations advocating Taiwanese independence. Supporters of the bill, led
SILENT MAJORITY: Only 1 percent of Chinese rejected all options but war to annex Taiwan, while one-third viewed war as unacceptable, a university study showed Many Chinese are more concerned with developments inside their country than with seeking unification with Taiwan, al-Jazeera reported on Friday. Although China claims Taiwan as its own territory and has vowed to annex it, by force if necessary, 23-year-old Chinese Shao Hongtian was quoted by al-Jazeera as saying that “hostilities are not the way to bring China and Taiwan together.” “I want unification to happen peacefully,” Shao said. Al-Jazeera said it changed Shao’s name to respect his wish for anonymity. If peaceful unification is not possible, Shao said he would prefer “things to remain as they are,” adding that many of his friends feel
Taiwan has “absolute air superiority” over China in its own airspace, Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) told a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee on Monday, amid concern over whether Taipei could defend itself against a military incursion by Beijing. Po made the remarks in response to a question from Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chiu Chih-wei (邱志偉) on whether Taiwan would have partial or complete air superiority if Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) warplanes were to enter Taiwan’s airspace. Po, a retired pilot, said that the Taiwanese military has “absolute air superiority” over PLA
A shipment of basil pesto imported by Costco Wholesale Taiwan from the US in the middle of last month was intercepted at the border after testing positive for excessive pesticide residue, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said yesterday. Samples taken from a shipment of the Kirkland Signature brand of basil pesto imported by Costco contained 0.1 milligrams per kilogram of ethylene oxide, exceeding the non-detectable limit. Ethylene oxide is a carcinogenic substance that can be used as a pesticide. The 674kg shipment of basil pesto would either be destroyed or returned to its country of origin, as is the procedure for all