CULTURE
Art exhibit a hit in Tokyo
An unprecedented exhibition of historical treasures from the National Palace Museum’s collection being held in Tokyo has drawn more than 120,000 visitors to since it opened on June 24, museum spokesman Chin Shih-hsien (金士先) said yesterday. The “Treasured Masterpieces from the National Palace Museum, Taipei” exhibit is to run until Sept. 15 at the Tokyo National Museum, before moving to Kyushu National Museum in Dazaifu, Fukuoka Prefecture, from Oct. 7 to Nov. 30. A total of 231 artifacts from the National Palace Museum are being displayed at the Tokyo and Kyushu shows, including ancient books, calligraphy, embroidery and paintings, as well as ceramic, bronze and jade pieces. The Taipei museum’s most popular piece, Jadeite Cabbage with Insects, concluded a two-week showing in Tokyo yesterday that marked the first time the jade carving has been loaned overseas. It will now be flown back to the National Palace Museum, where it will be put on display again from Friday, Chin said.
DIPLOMACY
Vietnam riot talks set: source
Taiwanese and Vietnamese officials could hold their second mediation session this week to discuss compensation for damages suffered by Taiwanese-owned businesses in Vietnam during anti-China riots that swept the country in May, a Ministry of Economic Affairs official said on condition of anonymity. The meeting is expected to address the 14 as of yet unfulfilled demands the government made to Hanoi at the first mediation session on June 11, which include insurance claims. Vietnam has already responded to 10 other demands, including swifter work visa issuance for Taiwanese and tax cuts for Taiwanese firms rebuilding their businesses there.
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