The Bureau of High Speed Rail and the Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp (THSRC) yesterday denied that a financial restructuring of the rail company was designed to benefit big corporations and Chinese investors.
The denial came after a story published by the Chinese-language weekly Next Magazine, which accused the Ministry of Transportation and Communications of intending to go against a resolution made by the Legislative Yuan about the plan, restricting funds from certain parties.
The story said the ministry planned to open a “back door” for big corporations, as well as those funded by Chinese investors, to increase their stakes in the firm.
THSRC released a statement saying it was no coincidence that the story was leaked.
“It is regrettable that some people took part of board meeting discussions, misinterpreted them and used them to mislead the public,” the company said. “Their intent is made even more suspect given the fact that the story was published before the company’s shareholders’ meeting next week.”
Based on the plan approved by the Legislative Yuan, the company is to reduce its capital by about 60 percent to erase debts, then increase capital by NT$30 billion (US$915 million).
The concession period is to be extended by 35 years.
To raise the funds, the company can only obtain funds from the state-run and state-affiliated agencies.
The Bureau of High Speed Rail said that NT$24.2 billion of the NT$30 billion is to come from the High Speed Rail-Relevant Construction Fund as per the resolution of the Legislative Yuan.
Corporations whose boards are controlled by the government or government-affiliated agencies are to raise NT$5.8 billion.
These requirements are listed in the amendment to the THSRC’s contract with the Bureau of High Speed Rail, which was signed on July 27.
The bureau said it has completed all the procedures to list the NT$24.2 billion in its budget.
The China Aviations Development Foundation is to invest NT$2.6 billion, whereas the remaining money is to be jointly invested by six government funded banks.
THSRC denied the story’s allegation that shares will be available in three years, saying the board meeting only passed a resolution that privately placed common shares must not be resold within three years after the delivery date as per the requirements of the Securities and Exchange Act (證券交易法).
“Transaction of the securities has nothing to do with the public issuance of stocks, this should be basic knowledge for those involved in stock market activities,” THSRC said.
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
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
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