SOCIETY
Actor Nicky Wu weds
Actor Nicky Wu (吳奇隆) yesterday announced his marriage to Chinese actress Liu Shishi (劉詩詩). The 44-year-old Wu posted photographs of the couple’s marriage certificate and rings with the caption “cherish happiness” on his Sina Weibo microblog. Wu and Liu, 27, met in 2011 on the set of the Chinese TV series Scarlet Heart (步步驚心), the show that made Liu famous. Wu shot to fame in the 1980s in Taiwan as a member of the Little Tigers boy band. He continued his singing career after the trio disbanded in 1995 and moved into acting. Since 2000 he has focused his career in China, starring in films and TV series.
HEALTH
Warning on monkey bites
The Centers for Disease Control urged visitors to Yushan National Park to be careful if encountering Formosan macaques after almost half the monkeys in the park’s Tataka area have tested positive for the herpes B virus. The agency said National Pingtung University of Science and Technology researchers recently tested Formosan macaques in the park and found 47 percent carried the virus, which can infect animals as well as humans. “If bitten by an infected Formosan macaque, people could be infected with the human herpes B virus,” CDC Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥) said. Although there are only 40 cases of humans being infected with the herpes B virus, the mortality rate is more than 70 percent for those who do not receive proper treatment, he said. Survivors are often left with serious after-effects, he said. If bitten by a monkey, the victim should sanitize the wound immediately with soap or iodine and wash it with clean water for 15 to 20 minutes before seeking medical treatment, he said. Victims should also be vaccinated against rabies.
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
The eastern extension of the Taipei MRT Red Line could begin operations as early as late June, the Taipei Department of Rapid Transit Systems said yesterday. Taipei Rapid Transit Corp said it is considering offering one month of free rides on the new section to mark its opening. Construction progress on the 1.4km extension, which is to run from the current terminal Xiangshan Station to a new eastern terminal, Guangci/Fengtian Temple Station, was 90.6 percent complete by the end of last month, the department said in a report to the Taipei City Council's Transportation Committee. While construction began in October 2016 with an
NON-RED SUPPLY: Boosting the nation’s drone industry is becoming increasingly urgent as China’s UAV dominance could become an issue in a crisis, an analyst said Taiwan’s drone exports to Europe grew 41.7-fold from 2024 to last year, with demand from Ukraine’s fight against Russian aggression the most likely driver of growth, a study showed. The Institute for Democracy, Society and Emerging Technology (DSET) in a statement on Wednesday said it found that many of Taiwan’s uncrewed aerial vehicle (UAV) sales were from Poland and the Czech Republic. These countries likely transferred the drones to Ukraine to aid it in its fight against the Russian invasion that started in 2022, it said. Despite the gains, Taiwan is not the dominant drone exporter to these markets, ranking second and fourth
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comment last year on Tokyo’s potential reaction to a Taiwan-China conflict has forced Beijing to rewrite its invasion plans, a retired Japanese general said. Takaichi told the Diet on Nov. 7 last year that a Chinese naval blockade or military attack on Taiwan could constitute a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan, potentially allowing Tokyo to exercise its right to collective self-defense. Former Japan Ground Self-Defense Force general Kiyofumi Ogawa said in a recent speech that the remark has been interpreted as meaning Japan could intervene in the early stages of a Taiwan Strait conflict, undermining China’s previous assumptions
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