DIPLOMACY
France, Taiwan honor pilot
France and Taiwan have jointly erected a monument to commemorate jet fighter pilot Colonel Wang Tung-yi (王同義), who died when his plane crashed during training in eastern France last year, the Ministry of National Defense said yesterday. The monument was unveiled on Thursday to mark the first anniversary of the accident and was erected at the site of the crash, the ministry said. The unveiling was attended by French Air Force officials and Taiwanese foreign affairs and military officials based in Europe, the ministry added. Following Wang’s death, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) issued a citation to commend the pilot’s outstanding performance and dedication. Wang was also awarded a medal and posthumously promoted to the rank of colonel. The 37-year-old pilot was praised for his heroic efforts in the final moments of the flight, when he maneuvered his Mirage 2000-5 jet clear of residential communities in the Luxeuil-les-Bains area to prevent loss of life. His fighter then crashed into a wooded area.
EDUCATION
Talks on Germany to be held
A series of seminars are to be held in Taipei this month to promote studying in Germany and working for German companies, the German Institute Taipei said. “The aim is to provide insight into a wide array of topics, from career prospects with German companies in Taiwan and in Germany, to visa regulations and German language tests,” the institute said in a statement. The seminar series will start tomorrow with an event titled “Meet the CEO,” in which 70 university graduates are invited to meet executives from four German companies’ offices in Taiwan: Bayer Taiwan Co, DMG Mori Seiki Taiwan Co, Robert Bosch Taiwan Co and Siemens Ltd Taiwan, the statement said, without providing information about the other seminars. About 250 German companies have set up businesses in Taiwan, especially in the machinery, electronics, automotive and chemicals sectors, the institute said.
BUSINESS
Taisugar denies pig rumors
Taiwan Sugar Corp (Taisugar) has denied rumors that it is involved in pig farming in China through technology-based investments, saying that it complies with domestic laws banning such practices. The Greater Tainan-based state-run enterprise brings 350,000 pigs into the Taiwanese market every year and is one of the nation’s leading pig breeder. Liu Tsung-hsien (劉宗憲), the head of Taisugar’s public relations department, said that by law, Taiwanese companies are prohibited from entering the pig farming business in China either through investments or technological cooperation. As a state-run company, Taisugar could not possibly break the law and surreptitiously obtain a stake in Chinese pig farms through technology transfers, Liu said. The accusations were made by a legislator who said that Taisugar has wanted to break into the Chinese market for a long time and was already raising pigs in the country through technology-based investments. Despite denying Taisugar’s presence in China, Liu did say that there are many incentives to invest in the Chinese sector because pigs fetch better prices there than they do in Taiwan. He also said that Taisugar executives have visited China’s Jiangsu and Shandong provinces to learn about the pig farming industry there.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater