AVIATION
Heavy fog delays flights
A total of 84 flights were delayed yesterday morning at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport because of heavy fog, officials said. From 5am until 9:30am, no planes were allowed to take off or land at the airport because visibility was less than 900m, airport officials said. Two incoming flights — one passenger flight and one cargo plane — were diverted to Kaohsiung International Airport, the officials said. The heavy fog engulfed the airport’s south and north runways in the early hours of the morning. As of 3pm, it had dispersed somewhat, but some flights were still being affected, officials said.
CRIME
Pigeon kidnappers nabbed
Seven people have been arrested in the south for allegedly kidnapping dozens of race pigeons for ransom, police said yesterday. The suspects were accused of setting traps along racing routes to capture the pigeons and demanding up to NT$5,000 in ransom per bird from the owners, the Criminal Investigation Bureau said. The alleged ringleader was nabbed when he met an owner to collect ransom earlier this week, police said, and he was found to be in possession of nearly 60 race pigeons. Pigeon racing is popular in the country, but has been linked to underground gambling.
WATER SUPPLY
Enough water in the south
Some areas in the south need not worry about a water shortage in the dry season, which usually ends when the plum rains begin in May, the Water Resources Agency (WRA) said on Tuesday. The Southern Region Water Resources Office said water supplies in the southern regions of Chiayi, Greater Tainan, Pingtung and the outlying island of Penghu are sustainable through the end of May. The Tsengwen and Wushantou reservoirs currently have about 300 million tonnes of water, representing about 50 percent of their storage capacities, the office said, adding that this is about the same level as at this time last year. The rainy season is usually from May to June — the plum rain season — followed by the typhoon season from July to September. Meanwhile, the water supply in Greater Kaohsiung, which is heavily reliant on the Gaoping River, might require further assessment as there are no large reservoirs serving the municipality, the office said.
RESEARCH
Colleges form ethics alliance
Nearly 50 colleges formed an alliance on Tuesday to jointly safeguard the rights of research subjects in human-related studies, said Tainan’s National Cheng Kung University (NCKU), a member of the group. The establishment of the biggest research ethics alliance in Taiwan, the South Taiwan Alliance for Research Ethics, was aimed at reducing the number of controversies triggered by studies on human behavior, the university said. The rights of research subjects came into the spotlight recently after media reports about researchers subjecting children to brain-wave experiments without parental consent and collecting saliva samples from Aboriginal minorities ruffled public sentiment. Led by NCKU, the 49 colleges from southern and eastern Taiwan and the outlying islands of Kinmen and Penghu formed the alliance — initiated by the National Science Council — to enhance cooperation and discipline in academic research. Under the partnership, alliance members are expected to assist one another in reviewing ethics issues in studies involving human subjects.
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