DEFENSE
Coast guard beef up arms
A number of Coast Guard Administration (CGA) patrol vessels will be installed with 40mm anti-aircraft guns supplied by the navy, according to the CGA. The first three of seven such guns will be installed on the patrol ship New Taipei, construction of which is expected to be completed by the end of this year, it said. Prior to installation, the guns will have their fire-control systems adapted by the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology because the current systems used by the navy are not suitable for Coast Guard vessels, it added. The CGA said it estimated it will cost NT$211.44 million (US$7.13 million) to adapt the systems.
GOVERNMENT
MOFA defends work holidays
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday said that Taiwanese on working holidays abroad should not be labeled as “Taiwanese laborers” since the holidays are more about learning than performing manual labor. The ministry was intent on polishing the image of working holidays after a local magazine report indicated that the program was turning into an overseas jobs scheme. Business Today told the story earlier in the week of a National Tsing Hua University economics graduate leaving Taiwan for a better-paying job at an Australian meat processing plant through the program, sparking concerns of more Taiwanese using working holidays to do manual labor in higher-wage countries. The ministry said in a statement yesterday that working holidays were launched to encourage students to venture overseas to broaden their horizons and enrich their international experience. The program has proven largely beneficial, helping many participants improve their language skills and find work after they return, it said, rejecting the idea that those who go on working holidays are simply “Taiwanese laborers.”
EDUCATION
Tokyo sponsors student trip
A group of Taiwanese high-school students yesterday traveled to Japan to learn more about the country’s reconstruction efforts following a devastating earthquake and tsunami last year. One hundred Taiwanese students departed for a nine-day trip sponsored by the Japanese government that will include one a stop at the Iwate Prefecture, which was hit hard by the magnitude 9 earthquake on March 11 last year, the Interchange Association, Japan, said in a statement. The Taiwanese youngsters will also live with Japanese host families and visit schools in Chiba Prefecture and Hiroshima Prefecture to learn more about the local culture, it said. The Japanese government initiated the program to thank countries that offered rescue assistance and donations after the earthquake and ensuing tsunami, said the association. Taiwan donated about US$260 million in relief and reconstruction aid to Japan, the most of any country in the world.
TOURISM
Visitor numbers near record
The number of visitor arrivals in Taiwan rose sharply in the first eight months of the year and could exceed 7 million for the first time in the country’s history, the Tourism Bureau said yesterday. A total of 4.77 million overseas visitors arrived in Taiwan between January and last month, up 24.76 percent from the same period last year, and visitor arrivals have posted double-digit annual growth every month so far this year, the bureau said. The surge was led by visitors from China, whose numbers grew 54.41 percent from a year earlier.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
REVENGE TRAVEL: A surge in ticket prices should ease this year, but inflation would likely keep tickets at a higher price than before the pandemic Scoot is to offer six additional flights between Singapore and Northeast Asia, with all routes transiting Taipei from April 1, as the budget airline continues to resume operations that were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, a Scoot official said on Thursday. Vice president of sales Lee Yong Sin (李榮新) said at a gathering with reporters in Taipei that the number of flights from Singapore to Japan and South Korea with a stop in Taiwan would increase from 15 to 21 each week. That change means the number of the Singapore-Taiwan-Tokyo flights per week would increase from seven to 12, while Singapore-Taiwan-Seoul
BAD NEIGHBORS: China took fourth place among countries spreading disinformation, with Hong Kong being used as a hub to spread propaganda, a V-Dem study found Taiwan has been rated as the country most affected by disinformation for the 11th consecutive year in a study by the global research project Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem). The nation continues to be a target of disinformation originating from China, and Hong Kong is increasingly being used as a base from which to disseminate that disinformation, the report said. After Taiwan, Latvia and Palestine ranked second and third respectively, while Nicaragua, North Korea, Venezuela and China, in that order, were the countries that spread the most disinformation, the report said. Each country listed in the report was given a score,
POOR PREPARATION: Cultures can form on food that is out of refrigeration for too long and cooking does not reliably neutralize their toxins, an epidemiologist said Medical professionals yesterday said that suspected food poisoning deaths revolving around a restaurant at Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 Store in Taipei could have been caused by one of several types of bacterium. Ho Mei-shang (何美鄉), an epidemiologist at Academia Sinica’s Institute of Biomedical Sciences, wrote on Facebook that the death of a 39-year-old customer of the restaurant suggests the toxin involved was either “highly potent or present in massive large quantities.” People who ate at the restaurant showed symptoms within hours of consuming the food, suggesting that the poisoning resulted from contamination by a toxin and not infection of the