WEATHER
Typhoon approaches
The outer rim of Typhoon Soudelor could start affecting Taiwan on Friday, bringing showers across the country, the Central Weather Bureau said yesterday. At 2am yesterday, Soudelor was centered 2,650km east-southeast of the nation’s southernmost tip, moving at 22kph in a west-northwesterly direction. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 144kph, with gusts reaching 180kph, the bureau said. The storm could bring rain to northern and eastern regions on Friday, with the southern and mountainous regions in central Taiwan also expected to see showers from later that day, forecasters said. The future trajectory of Soudelor will depend on the strength of a Pacific high-pressure system in the coming few days, the bureau said. According to the current forecast, the typhoon could reach eastern Taiwan over the weekend.
LAW
E-cigarette sales up: group
The John Tung Foundation called for tighter control of e-cigarette sales after recording a dramatic increase in the number of tip-offs of illegal sales. According to the charity, it received 4,436 reports of illegal sales of e-cigarettes from January to June, more than six times the total number of reports it received last year. The group said the jump in the number of tip-offs show that the government’s attempt to regulate e-cigarettes under the Pharmaceutical Affairs Act (藥事法) has not worked. Although the Ministry of Health and Welfare does not allow e-cigarettes to be manufactured, imported or sold in the nation, they are widely available online and through street vendors, the foundation said. If e-cigarettes were regulated under the Tobacco Hazards Prevention Act (菸害防制法), there could be tighter control of the user end, and online sales would be banned as a result, the group said.
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
Taiwan will now have four additional national holidays after the Legislative Yuan passed an amendment today, which also made Labor Day a national holiday for all sectors. The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) used their majority in the Legislative Yuan to pass the amendment to the Act on Implementing Memorial Days and State Holidays (紀念日及節日實施辦法), which the parties jointly proposed, in its third and final reading today. The legislature passed the bill to amend the act, which is currently enforced administratively, raising it to the legal level. The new legislation recognizes Confucius’ birthday on Sept. 28, the
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
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