EDUCATION
Japan magazine holds show
About half of the fans on the Facebook page devoted to the Japanese magazine Otona no Kagaku (Science for Adults) are Taiwanese, said Toshiyuki Nishimura, the magazine’s editor in chief. The magazine is holding its first overseas exhibition as part of its celebrations of its 10th anniversary in its current format. The exhibition, which features some of the scientific models that come with the magazine, is being held at Eslite bookstore’s Xinyi branch until the end of the month. A mini planetarium projector illustrating 50,000 stars is one of the models on display. The magazine started out in the 1960s as a scientific monthly for elementary-school students. Today, it is targeted at the adults who read the original magazine as children, Nishimura said.
EDUCATION
Anti-drug efforts mulled
The Ministry of Education said on Sunday that it is mulling establishing a performance appraisal system for school officials to help reduce drug abuse among students. Although government agencies follow the Ministry of Justice’s drug use regulations, there are no such rules for front-line educators, education ministry officials said. A appraisal system based on rewarding teachers or officials could help encourage anti-drug efforts on campuses, they said. Teachers who fail to compile lists of students who have been reported by the police for drug abuse could receive demerits for professional negligence, they added. National Federation of Teachers Unions secretary-general Lee Ya-ching (李雅菁) said that while a standard code of conduct would make it easier for schools to carry out anti-drug campaigns, it might also hurt teachers’ morale. A demerit will affect teachers’ pensions, while forcing students to take drug tests might violate their rights, she said.
ENTERTAINMENT
Mayday end tour of China
The band Mayday (五月天) finished its China tour on Saturday by performing before 100,000 enthusiastic fans in Beijing. Tens of thousands of glow sticks created a spectacle at the concert, which saw passionate fans jumping up and down to the music, shaking the floor of the Beijing National Stadium. As part of its “Noah’s Ark” world tour of 40 cities, the band played 50 concerts in 31 Chinese cities. The band will return home to perform on Sept. 6, 7, 14 and 15 in Greater Taichung. Mayday will embark on its first European tour next spring, with shows scheduled in the UK, the Netherlands, France and Germany.
LABOR
Furlough numbers drop
The number of employees forced to take leave without pay had dropped slightly as of Thursday last week, Council of Labor Affairs statistics showed. The data also showed a small decrease in the number of companies resorting to furloughs to cut costs. As of the middle of this month, 663 workers at 32 companies had reached agreements with their employers to take furloughs, the figures showed. The data from the previous two weeks showed that 704 workers at 34 companies had agreed to such arrangements. The figures at the end of the first two weeks this month were significantly lower than at the end of last year, when 4,450 workers had furlough agreements, indicating a more stable labor market, despite tepid economic growth. Employers are required to sign written agreements with their workers before placing them on furlough. The council encourages workers to call its hotline (0800-085151) to file complaints about suspected violation of the rules or other irregularities.
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