CENSUS
Population rises to 23.46m
The nation’s population totaled 23.46 million as of the end of last month, according to the latest statistics released by the Ministry of the Interior. The figure represents an increase of 69,662, or 0.3 percent, from a year earlier, an average increase of 191 people per day, the ministry said. Compared with last year, the number of men rose by 18,798, or 0.16 percent, to 11.7 million, while women jumped by 50,864, or 0.43 percent, to 11.75 million. The population of women surpassed that of men for the first time in November 2013 and the trend has continued since then, the ministry said. Among the reasons for the greater number of women are the immigration of female foreign spouses, improvements in the average lifespan of women and the ban on fetal gender screening the ministry said. Compared with last year, Kinmen County recorded the highest population growth of any administrative district in Taiwan at 5 percent. The population of Chiayi County saw the largest drop, decreasing by 0.97 percent.
TRAVEL
Chinese visitors near 4m
Chinese appear to be losing interest in Taiwan as a destination for health checks and aesthetic medical procedures, according to figures released on Saturday by the Ministry of the Interior. Last year, 54,433 Chinese visited for health checks and aesthetic procedures, down 40,884 from 2013, when the figure was 95,317, the data showed. Chinese made 3.95 million visits last year, an increase of 1.1 million visits, or 38.6 percent, from the previous year, according to the statistics. The data indicated that 3.32 million, or 84.3 percent, of the Chinese visitors last year came for tourism purposes; 154,799, or 3.9 percent, for professional exchanges; and 111,995, or 2.8 percent, for business.
HISTORY
Chiang documents auctioned
More than 100 documents written by Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) were sold for a total of 17.83 million yuan (US$2.87 million) at a recent auction in Beijing. The 140 documents were dated from January 1935 to February 1945 and covered the period of the Second Sino-Japanese war, according to Chinese media. The documents had been in the possession of descendants of Chiang’s chief aide, Chien Ta-chun (錢大鈞), the reports said. The content included Chiang’s comments on the political situation at the time and complaints about his subordinates, according to the reports. The documents handwritten by Chiang have significant historical value and attracted a great deal of attention before the auction, Chinese media reported. The starting bid was 8 million yuan, but the documents eventually fetched double that amount, going under the hammer at 17.83 million yuan, the reports said.
ARTS
Festival to feature diversity
The music festival that accompanies the Golden Melody Awards will this year feature several concerts covering different musical genres to showcase the diversity of music in Taiwan, organizers said. The Global Music Festival concerts to be held from June 24 to June 26 are to feature 24 groups of musicians, including avant-garde electronic band Lie Gramophone (謊言留聲機), six-man rap group Boxing from the Paiwan people, Mandopop singer Victor Wong (品冠) and electronic dance and rock band OVDS. The concerts are to include rock, folk, electronic, hip-hop and dance music, according to the Ministry of Culture’s Bureau of Audiovisual and Music Industry Development.
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