ENVIRONMENT
Minister cites islands’ value
Minister of the Interior Lee Hong-yuan (李鴻源) expressed hope that the Pratas Islands (東沙群島, Dongsha Islands) in the South China Sea could be developed as a marine research center. Coral cover near the islands has been increasing and the atoll provides habitats for a wide variety of marine species, so they have a high conservation value, Lee said during a recent inspection of the Dongsha Atoll National Park. The islands are also suitable for large-scale research, Lee said, adding that he hopes to promote the islands as a marine research center. Marine National Park Headquarters director Yang Mo-lin (楊模麟) said that the Dongsha atoll park and the National Science Council last year jointly launched marine science and ecological studies on the islands, which have attracted Russian and French academics to the islands for similar studies.
CRIME
Three Taiwanese jailed
Three Taiwanese were sentenced to life imprisonment in Indonesia for selling drugs, the Criminal Investigation Bureau said on Tuesday. Yueh Ying-tsung (岳瀛宗), a bureau official stationed in Indonesia, said the three, surnamed Chen (陳), Huang (黃) and Yeh (葉), were convicted by the Indonesian Supreme Court of selling amphetamine, a class-A drug. According to Indonesian media Republika Online, Artidjo Alkostar, a director at the Supreme Court, said the three were sentenced to 18 years in prison during earlier trials in the district and high courts. Artidjo said the Supreme Court decided to increase their sentences because they had also been producing methamphetamine. Yueh said there are currently more than 30 Taiwanese incarcerated in Jakarta and in Central Java for involvement in drug dealing.
EDUCATION
Ben-Shahar to visit, lecture
Israeli author and lecturer Tal Ben-Shahar, who gained fame for the courses on positive psychology he taught at Harvard University, will give a speech in Taipei on June 18, the CommonWealth Magazine Group said yesterday. Ben-Shahar will address company managers, teachers and other professionals on the topic of positive leadership and will give another speech to a general audience on how to lead a happy life, the company said. The main focus of his visit will be to promote the Chinese version of his new book, Choose the Life You Want: 101 Ways to Create Your Own Road to Happiness. His two speeches will be given at the Civil Service Development Institute in Taipei. Ben-Shahar taught the largest course at Harvard, “Positive Psychology” and the third-largest, “The Psychology of Leadership,” which drew hundreds of students. He now teaches at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, Israel, and works as a consultant to Fortune 500 companies.
WEATHER
Cold front could bring rain
The nation could have an increasing chance of rain and thunderstorms from tomorrow as a cold front approaches, the Central Weather Bureau said yesterday. The unstable weather could be most significant in northern and eastern Taiwan between tomorrow and Saturday, although the rain should ease from Tuesday next week, forecasters said. Daily high temperatures nationwide could drop by 4oC to 6oC over the weekend, the bureau said. The mercury in the north is expected to range between 18oC and 26oC, while the south could see temperatures ranging between 22oC and 27oC.
Former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) mention of Taiwan’s official name during a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on Wednesday was likely a deliberate political play, academics said. “As I see it, it was intentional,” National Chengchi University Graduate Institute of East Asian Studies professor Wang Hsin-hsien (王信賢) said of Ma’s initial use of the “Republic of China” (ROC) to refer to the wider concept of “the Chinese nation.” Ma quickly corrected himself, and his office later described his use of the two similar-sounding yet politically distinct terms as “purely a gaffe.” Given Ma was reading from a script, the supposed slipup
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,
The bodies of two individuals were recovered and three additional bodies were discovered on the Shakadang Trail (砂卡礑) in Taroko National Park, eight days after the devastating earthquake in Hualien County, search-and-rescue personnel said. The rescuers reported that they retrieved the bodies of a man and a girl, suspected to be the father and daughter from the Yu (游) family, 500m from the entrance of the trail on Wednesday. The rescue team added that despite the discovery of the two bodies on Friday last week, they had been unable to retrieve them until Wednesday due to the heavy equipment needed to lift