The Taipei Zoo on Friday accused rapper Qmone (Q毛萬) and two other men of breaking into the zoo after hours and frightening the animals with a flashlight.
The Taipei Police Department’s Wenshan First Precinct is to investigate the case by questioning Qmone, whose real name is Chen Po-jui (陳柏瑞), and reviewing a video of the alleged incident uploaded to YouTube in February.
The zoo said that Qmone and his two friends prepared gloves, flashlights and food for their midnight excursion.
The rapper said it was “the right thing to do at the wrong time.”
The trio allegedly wandered around looking for giraffes and lions and repeatedly disturbed animals by shining flashlights into the pens, zoo police said.
Although the video was uploaded this year, Qmone said it happened in February last year.
Zoo spokesperson Tsao Hsien-shao (曹先紹) accused the intruders of breaking and entering on government property, an offense prosecutable under the Criminal Code, and said that shining flashlights directly in animals’ faces violates the Wildlife Conservation Act (野生動物保育法).
The three are also accused of urinating outside the zoo — a breach of the city’s Department of Environmental Protection and Department of Health regulations, Tsao said.
The zoo saved the video and provided a copy to police, Tsao added.
Qmone is a Chinese Culture University student, netizens said on social media.
Tsao urged the university to make a statement condemning his actions, saying this sort of behavior should not be encouraged.
In Facebook comments on Friday, Qmone asked netizens why caging animals is legal, but his excursion is not.
Netizens said that under the Animal Protection Act, keeping animals in cages “was indeed legal.”
Qmone deleted his comments by Friday evening.
An increase in Taiwanese boats using China-made automatic identification systems (AIS) could confuse coast guards patrolling waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast and become a loophole in the national security system, sources familiar with the matter said yesterday. Taiwan ADIZ, a Facebook page created by enthusiasts who monitor Chinese military activities in airspace and waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast, on Saturday identified what seemed to be a Chinese cargo container ship near Penghu County. The Coast Guard Administration went to the location after receiving the tip and found that it was a Taiwanese yacht, which had a Chinese AIS installed. Similar instances had also
GOOD DIPLOMACY: The KMT has maintained close contact with representative offices in Taiwan and had extended an invitation to Russia as well, the KMT said The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) would “appropriately handle” the fallout from an invitation it had extended to Russia’s representative to Taipei to attend its international banquet last month, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday. US and EU representatives in Taiwan boycotted the event, and only later agreed to attend after the KMT rescinded its invitation to the Russian representative. The KMT has maintained long-term close contact with all representative offices and embassies in Taiwan, and had extended the invitation as a practice of good diplomacy, Chu said. “Some EU countries have expressed their opinions of Russia, and the KMT respects that,” he
VIGILANCE: The military is paying close attention to actions that might damage peace and stability in the region, the deputy minister of national defense said The People’s Republic of China (PRC) might consider initiating a hack on Taiwanese networks on May 20, the day of the inauguration ceremony of president-elect William Lai (賴清德), sources familiar with cross-strait issues said. While US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s statement of the US expectation “that all sides will conduct themselves with restraint and prudence in the period ahead” would prevent military actions by China, Beijing could still try to sabotage Taiwan’s inauguration ceremony, the source said. China might gain access to the video screens outside of the Presidential Office Building and display embarrassing messages from Beijing, such as congratulating Lai
Four China Coast Guard ships briefly sailed through prohibited waters near Kinmen County, Taipei said, urging Beijing to stop actions that endanger navigation safety. The Chinese ships entered waters south of Kinmen, 5km from the Chinese city of Xiamen, at about 3:30pm on Monday, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement later the same day. The ships “sailed out of our prohibited and restricted waters” about an hour later, the agency said, urging Beijing to immediately stop “behavior that endangers navigation safety.” Ministry of National Defense spokesman Sun Li-fang (孫立方) yesterday told reporters that Taiwan would boost support to the Coast Guard