A civic group opposed to the government’s plan to lift a ban on food and agricultural produce from five prefectures in Japan is to travel to Japan later this month to measure radiation levels.
Green Consumers’ Foundation chairman Jay Fang (方儉) said that while a government team went to Japan in August, it did not have its own radiation detection equipment.
The team relied entirely on data provided by Japan, and the report provided was very “rough,” he said.
Fang said he and three others would head to 25 locations in six prefectures — Chiba, Fukushima, Gunma, Tochigi, Ibaraki and Yamanashi — to check radiation levels in the food and the environment for themselves on Nov. 22.
Taiwan suspended food imports from the Japanese prefectures of Fukushima, Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma and Chiba following the 2011 Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant disaster.
The Executive Yuan on Thursday evening announced that 10 public hearings would be held nationwide from yesterday to tomorrow on the issue, amid reports that it will soon lift the ban on imported food items from the prefectures.
Fang said that he has two-and-a-half years of experience working in a laboratory and that his companions also have similar experience.
He said that they are “qualified personnel” and that their equipment meets International Atomic Energy Agency standards.
The inspections will be streamed live on his Facebook page, he said, welcoming the government to follow them online.
Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) was sentenced to six months in prison, commutable to a fine, by the New Taipei District Court today for contravening the Personal Data Protection Act (個人資料保護法) in a case linked to an alleged draft-dodging scheme. Wang allegedly paid NT$3.6 million (US$114,380) to an illegal group to help him evade mandatory military service through falsified medical documents, prosecutors said. He transferred the funds to Chen Chih-ming (陳志明), the alleged mastermind of a draft-evasion ring, although he lost contact with him as he was already in detention on fraud charges, they said. Chen is accused of helping a
UNREASONABLE SURVEILLANCE: A camera targeted on an road by a neighbor captured a man’s habitual unsignaled turn into home, netting him dozens of tickets The Taichung High Administrative Court has canceled all 45 tickets given to a man for failing to use a turn signal while driving, as it considered long-term surveillance of his privacy more problematic than the traffic violations. The man, surnamed Tseng (曾), lives in Changhua County and was reported 45 times within a month for failing to signal while driving when he turned into the alley where his residence is. The reports were filed by his neighbor, who set up security cameras that constantly monitored not only the alley but also the door and yard of Tseng’s house. The surveillance occurred from July
SECURITY: Starlink owner Elon Musk has taken pro-Beijing positions, and allowing pro-China companies to control Taiwan’s critical infrastructure is risky, a legislator said Starlink was reluctant to offer services in Taiwan because of the nation’s extremely high penetration rates in 4G and 5G services, the Ministry of Digital Affairs said yesterday. The ministry made the comments at a meeting of the legislature’s Transportation Committee, which reviewed amendments to Article 36 of the Telecommunications Management Act (電信管理法). Article 36 bans foreigners from holding more than 49 percent of shares in public telecommunications networks, while shares foreigners directly and indirectly hold are also capped at 60 percent of the total, unless specified otherwise by law. The amendments, sponsored by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Ko
A Japan Self-Defense Forces vessel entered the Taiwan Strait yesterday, Japanese media reported. After passing through the Taiwan Strait, the Ikazuchi was to proceed to the South China Sea to take part in a joint military exercise with the US and the Philippines, the reports said. Japan Self-Defense Force vessels were first reported to have passed through the strait in September, 2024, with two further transits taking place in February and June last year, the Asahi Shimbun reported. Yesterday’s transit also marked the first time since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi took office that a Japanese warship has been sent through the Taiwan
RSS