SOCIETY
Welfare banquets held
More than 30,000 homeless and Aboriginal people attended free year-end banquets held in 13 locations around the country on Wednesday, representing a record-high attendance for the annual event since 1990. The banquets — sponsored by the Huashan, Genesis and Ren-an Homeless Social Welfare Foundations in Taipei, Greater Taichung, Greater Kaohsiung, Pingtung and Greater Tainan, as well as Hualien and Chiayi counties — and the distribution of red envelopes containing NT$200, plus a NT$100 coupon, cost a total of NT$35 million (US$1.17 million). More than 2,000 volunteers helped to serve and provide some warmth to the needy ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday on Jan. 23. Hosting the year-end banquets was not easy this year, especially because they ended up with 30 percent less then their budget goal, the organizers said.
SOCIETY
Suspect’s body cremated
The body of Chang Chih-yang (張志揚), a Taiwanese man who was the main suspect in the murder of two of his Taiwanese language school classmates in Tokyo, was cremated in the Japanese city of Nagoya yesterday. Chang’s parents bought a pair of shoes as their last gift for their son before his cremation. They were scheduled to return to Taiwan with Chang’s ashes this morning. Lin Chih-ying (林芷瀅) and Julia Chu (朱立婕) were stabbed in their dormitory on Jan. 5. Chang slashed himself with a knife and bled to death on Monday while in police custody after he was located by police at a theater in Nagoya. Japanese police said Chang admitted to killing Lin and Chu with a knife and that he was remorseful. The ashes of the two victims were brought back to Taiwan by their families on Wednesday following their cremation in Tokyo.
Taiwan is to receive the first batch of Lockheed Martin F-16 Block 70 jets from the US late this month, a defense official said yesterday, after a year-long delay due to a logjam in US arms deliveries. Completing the NT$247.2 billion (US$7.69 billion) arms deal for 66 jets would make Taiwan the third nation in the world to receive factory-fresh advanced fighter jets of the same make and model, following Bahrain and Slovakia, the official said on condition of anonymity. F-16 Block 70/72 are newly manufactured F-16 jets built by Lockheed Martin to the standards of the F-16V upgrade package. Republic of China
Taiwan-Japan Travel Passes are available for use on public transit networks in the two countries, Taoyuan Metro Corp said yesterday, adding that discounts of up to 7 percent are available. Taoyuan Metro, the Taipei MRT and Japan’s Keisei Electric Railway teamed up to develop the pass. Taoyuan Metro operates the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport MRT Line, while Keisei Electric Railway offers express services between Tokyo’s Narita Airport, and the Keisei Ueno and Nippori stations in the Japanese capital, as well as between Narita and Haneda airports. The basic package comprises one one-way ticket on the Taoyuan MRT Line and one Skyliner ticket on
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it