Legislative Speaker Su Jia-chyuan (蘇嘉全) yesterday handed over NT$24.45 million (US$774,286) donated by Taiwanese to Japan to be used in recovery efforts after an earthquake hit Kyushu Island on April 16.
Su, leading a 23-member legislative delegation on a visit to Japan, presented the money to Mitsuo Ohashi, chairman of Japan’s Interchange Association, which handles bilateral exchanges between Taiwan and Japan in the absence of diplomatic relations.
The donations were made to an account opened by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, Su said.
He said he hopes the funds help ongoing earthquake recovery efforts in Kumamoto Prefecture.
Taiwan and Japan have maintained a close relationship and have helped each other in times of difficulty, Su said.
Japan offered extensive support and assistance to Taiwan in the wake of a series of gas explosions in Kaohsiung in 2014, a deadly flash fire at a New Taipei City water park last year and a magnitude 6.4 earthquake in February in Tainan, Su said.
Ohashi thanked Taiwanese and said many Japanese remember the support and help offered by Taiwan after a magnitude 9 earthquake devastated northeastern Japan in 2011.
He said Taiwanese tourists are invited to visit Kumamoto to help boost its tourism.
Ohashi also said he hopes relations between Taiwan and Japan continue to grow and serve as a model to the international community.
Following the handover, Ohashi hosted a luncheon for the Taiwanese delegation.
The delegation was later scheduled to meet with Hiroyuki Hosoda, acting secretary-general of Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party, and Yukio Edano, secretary-general of the opposition Democratic Party of Japan, and visit the Tokyo National Museum.
Today, the delegation is to meet with Nobuo Kishi, a Japanese parliamentarian who is the brother of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and head of a group of young Japanese lawmakers.
A drunk woman was sexually assaulted inside a crowded concourse of Taipei Railway Station on Thursday last week before a foreign tourist notified police, leading to calls for better education on bystander intervention and review of security infrastructure. The man, surnamed Chiu (邱), was taken into custody on charges of sexual assault, taking advantage of the woman’s condition and public indecency. Police discovered that Chiu was a fugitive with prior convictions for vehicle theft. He has been taken into custody and is to complete his unserved six-month sentence, police said. On Thursday last week, Chiu was seen wearing a white
EVA Airways, one of the leading international carriers in Taiwan, yesterday said that it was investigating reports that a cabin crew manager had ignored the condition of a sick flight attendant, who died on Saturday. The airline made the statement in response to a post circulating on social media that said that the flight attendant on an outbound flight was feeling sick and notified the cabin crew manager. Although the flight attendant grew increasingly ill on the return flight, the manager did not contact Medlink — a system that connects the aircraft to doctors on the ground for treatment advice during medical
The Taoyuan Flight Attendants’ Union yesterday vowed to protest at the EVA Air Marathon on Sunday next week should EVA Airway Corp’s management continue to ignore the union’s petition to change rules on employees’ leave of absence system, after a flight attendant reportedly died after working on a long-haul flight while ill. The case has generated public discussion over whether taking personal or sick leave should affect a worker’s performance review. Several union members yesterday protested at the Legislative Yuan, holding white flowers and placards, while shouting: “Life is priceless; requesting leave is not a crime.” “The union is scheduled to meet with
‘UNITED FRONT’ RHETORIC: China’s TAO also plans to hold weekly, instead of biweekly, news conferences because it wants to control the cross-strait discourse, an expert said China’s plan to expand its single-entry visa-on-arrival service to Taiwanese would be of limited interest to Taiwanese and is a feeble attempt by Chinese administrators to demonstrate that they are doing something, the Mainland Affairs Council said yesterday. China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) spokesman Chen Binhua (陳斌華) said the program aims to facilitate travel to China for Taiwanese compatriots, regardless of whether they are arriving via direct flights or are entering mainland China through Hong Kong, Macau or other countries, and they would be able to apply for a single-entry visa-on-arrival at all eligible entry points in China. The policy aims
RSS