WEATHER
Tropical storm brings rain
A tropical depression located south of Taiwan had strengthened to a tropical storm late on Saturday, but is not expected to have a significant impact on Taiwan, the Central Weather Bureau said yesterday. Tropical Storm Vicente was centered 210km southwest of the Dongsha Islands (東沙群島), moving at 12kph in a west-northwesterly direction, according to officials. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 72kph, with gusts reaching 101kph. As the storm approaches, eastern Taiwan has experienced heavy rainfalls, with Donghe Township (東河) in Taitung County already seeing daily precipitation exceeding 148mm as of noon. However, besides regional showers and strengthening winds introduced by Vicente’s outer rim, the storm is not likely to bring extreme weather to the island, bureau officials said.
DEFENSE
New rockets next month
The military is scheduled to take delivery next month of additional Ray Ting 2000, or “Thunder 2000,” multiple-rocket launch systems, as it plans to phase out the current rocket system introduced three decades ago, the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) reported. The multibarrel system, developed by the Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology, can launch 40 rockets in a minute with a range of 45km, military experts cited in the report said. The system, which was first introduced in 1997, can neutralize amphibious craft before they reach the shore, they added. The truck-mounted launchers can be combat ready in eight minutes, less than half the time the current system needs to position itself, the report said. The ministry plans to produce more than 50 systems at a cost of NT$14.5 billion (US$483 million), media reported.
SOCIETY
Population drop on hold
The nation’s population growth may not turn negative in 2023 as projected, but two to five years later, the Council for Economic Planning and Development said yesterday. In 2010, the council forecast that Taiwan’s population growth would hit zero in 2022 and enter negative territory in 2023. However, in a biennial report expected to be released today, the council changed its forecast, saying this may not happen until two to five years later since the country’s birthrate has been increasing. The latest report, Projections for ROC (Taiwan): 2012-2060, also forecast that Taiwan’s categorization as an “ageing society” in 2017 may be delayed by one or two years. A country is designated as an ageing society when 14 percent or more of its population is over 64. According data from the Ministry of Interior, the fertility rate was 0.89 in 2010, but rose to 1.07 last year.
CHARITY
Dental mission brings smiles
A group of Taiwanese dentists said yesterday they will head to Honduras as part of a week-long medical mission, providing free dental implant treatments. The dentists will be joined by dentists from the US, Spain, Japan, South Korea, the Philippines and China in bringing smiles back to Honduran patients, said Leon Chen (陳俊龍) of the Dental Implant Institute, the organizer of the mission. It is unsure how many patients will benefit, since evaluations will be conducted after the team’s arrival on Wednesday, he said. Chen noted however that Rosa Elena de Lobo, the first lady of the Central American country, will be among the individuals receiving implants.
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