CHARITY
Donations for Syria needed
World Vision Taiwan called on the public yesterday to give to Syrian refugees, saying that its international headquarters is still US$17 million short of its goal for relief funds. World Vision International has so far raised US$43 million for Syrian refugees, but it hopes to raise US$60 million for the mission, the local chapter said. As of Thursday last week, World Vision International had assisted more than 230,000 Syrian refugees in Syria, Jordan and Lebanon, and it estimates that the number of displaced people will increase to 500,000 in the coming months. The charity said it allocated US$100,000 in July to help Syrian refugees. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees said on Tuesday that more 2 million refugees have fled Syria because of the country’s civil war, while more than 4 million others are displaced within the country.
POLITICS
Summit set for Kaohsiung
The mayors or delegates from 72 cities will attend this year’s Asia-Pacific Cities Summit (APCS) from Monday to Wednesday next week in Greater Kaohsiung, according to the city government. As of Tuesday, 47 mayors had said they would take part in the regional forum for civic and business leaders. They include the mayors of Taiwan’s six municipalities and cities. Administrators or delegates will also be coming from Brisbane, Vienna, Honolulu and Seattle, Kumamoto (Japan), Incheon (South Korea), Tianjin (China) and the Kumgangsan tourism special administration district of North Korea. This year’s APCS will be held under the theme: “Reshaping the Urbanomics of Cities — City Challenges and City Solutions,” and will include forums and discussions.
TOURISM
Tourism to Japan continues
Travel to Japan by Taiwanese has shown no signs of decreasing, despite a significant rise in radiation levels at Japan’s damaged Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, the Travel Agent Association of Taiwan said yesterday. Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority said that day that recorded radiation levels at the power plant have spiked more than 20 percent to 2,200 millisieverts, up from 1,800 millisieverts recorded on Aug. 31. Roget Hsu (許高慶), secretary-general of the association, said the information has had little effect on Taiwanese tourists because tour groups have avoided visiting areas potentially affected by radiation leaks since the 2011 earthquake and tsunami that led to a meltdown of three reactors at the power plant.
WEATHER
Storms damage agriculture
Two tropical storms that hit the nation last month have caused agricultural losses of more than NT$700 million (US$23.51 million), with Chiayi County the worst-affected, the Council of Agriculture said yesterday. As of 11am yesterday, the estimated agricultural losses connected to tropical storms Trami and Kong-Rey since Aug. 20 had reached NT$736.94 million, the council said. Southern Taiwan posted the greatest losses, as the region was battered by torrential rain brought by Tropical Storm Kong-Rey, which skirted the country on Aug. 28. Chiayi County reported losses of NT$295.20 million, followed by Yunlin County with NT$248.45 million. Greater Tainan and Kaohsiung and Pingtung County each suffered losses estimated at tens of millions of dollars.
HEALTH
Ferret-badgers test positive
Two ferret-badgers tested positive for rabies on Tuesday, bringing the total number of confirmed infections to 112 wild animals since the deadly disease resurfaced in middle of July after a seeming absence of 52 years. The Central Epidemic Command Center for Rabies yesterday announced the two newly confirmed infections, which came from Greater Tainan and Taitung County. Including the latest two, rabies-infected animals have been found across 47 administrative divisions of nine counties and cities in central, southern and eastern areas. As of Tuesday, a total of 490 wild animals had been tested for the disease, according to the command center. Of the 112 confirmed rabies infections, one was an infected Asian house shrew while all of the rest were ferret-badgers.
TRANSPORTATION
Events to mark road opening
Separate running and cycling events will be held tomorrow and on Saturday in Changhua County’s Yuanlin Township (員林) to mark the opening of a new road that is a focal point of a redevelopment project in the town, the county government said. The county government recently completed the preliminary redevelopment of a 184 hectare area in Yuanlin that now includes basic infrastructure, parks, and a revamped road system to help traffic in the area flow more smoothly. The centerpiece of the new network is an 8.84km-long, 30m-wide ring road, and to celebrate its opening, an evening run will be held on it tomorrow and a cycling event will be staged there on Saturday. The evening run has become a popular activity in the central county, with membership of Yuanlin’s jogging club growing to more than 3,800. The cycling event scheduled for Saturday morning will follow the formal opening ceremony for the new roadway, which has a 2m-wide cycling path on either side of it.
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