WEATHER
Temperature to fall
Temperatures tomorrow are to fall as low as 16°C as seasonal winds from the northeast intensify, the Central Weather Bureau said yesterday. The north is to see the greatest effect, with daytime temperatures of up to 23°C, bureau forecaster Lee Meng-hsuan (李孟軒) said. Temperatures in central and southern Taiwan could fall to 17°C and 19°C respectively from daytime highs of 25°C to 27°C, Lee said. The system could continue to affect conditions around the nation until Saturday, but its strength is expected to fade after tomorrow, sending temperatures higher. Yesterday, a cloud system moved north from southern Taiwan, causing scattered rainfall around the nation and heavy rain in mountainous areas. Daytime temperatures were about 23°C in the north and rose up to 27°C in central and southern Taiwan, the bureau added.
ENTERTAINMENT
Taipei 101 to host party
Taipei 101 is for the first time to host a “#Party101 Jazz Night Lounge Party” on its first floor office lobby on New Year’s Eve. In addition to jazz performances, virtual-reality games and photograph sticker machines, hundreds of bottles of whiskey, thousands of bottles of craft beer, soft drinks and various light refreshments are to be offered to partygoers. Only 1,010 guests would be able to attend, of which 500 could pay extra to watch the New Year fireworks from the building’s viewing platform. Tickets are to go on sale on Dec. 1. The skyscraper is also to hold its annual fireworks show, which is to feature 16,000 fireworks and its “T-Pad” LED lighting system measuring 100.8m by 168m on the building’s north side.
POLITICS
Chang eyes presidency
Former premier Simon Chang (張善政), who advised Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidates in Saturday’s nine-in-one elections, on Monday said he is considering running in the 2020 presidential election as an independent candidate. The 64-year-old, who serves as chairman of the Taiwan Mobile Foundation, said that he began to consider joining the race when people asked him to run for president while stumping for candidates in Saturday’s local elections. Chang was vice premier under former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) from Dec. 7, 2014, to Feb. 1, 2016. Chang then served as premier until May 20, 2016.
ARTS
Cheang to fly to Venice
Taiwanese multimedia artist Cheang Shu-lea (鄭淑麗) is to represent the nation at the 58th Venice Arte Biennale, the first female artist to be chosen since 2015, the Taiwan Fine Arts Museum said on Monday. Cheang is to be the first woman to represent the Taiwan pavilion since the nation began to send a single artist to the biennale in 2015, according to the museum’s press release. Cheang said in a statement that her piece, titled 3x3x6, was inspired by the exhibition venue, Palazzo delle Prigioni, which was a Venetian government prison in the 16th century. The work addresses the theme of crime and punishment, as well as modern imprisonment and surveillance devices, and 10 historical figures imprisoned due to their sexual orientation are included in the piece to highlight transgender issues, the artist said. The 58th Venice Arte Biennale is to take place from May 11 to Nov. 24 next year, according to the exhibition’s Web site.
Former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) mention of Taiwan’s official name during a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on Wednesday was likely a deliberate political play, academics said. “As I see it, it was intentional,” National Chengchi University Graduate Institute of East Asian Studies professor Wang Hsin-hsien (王信賢) said of Ma’s initial use of the “Republic of China” (ROC) to refer to the wider concept of “the Chinese nation.” Ma quickly corrected himself, and his office later described his use of the two similar-sounding yet politically distinct terms as “purely a gaffe.” Given Ma was reading from a script, the supposed slipup
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
The bodies of two individuals were recovered and three additional bodies were discovered on the Shakadang Trail (砂卡礑) in Taroko National Park, eight days after the devastating earthquake in Hualien County, search-and-rescue personnel said. The rescuers reported that they retrieved the bodies of a man and a girl, suspected to be the father and daughter from the Yu (游) family, 500m from the entrance of the trail on Wednesday. The rescue team added that despite the discovery of the two bodies on Friday last week, they had been unable to retrieve them until Wednesday due to the heavy equipment needed to lift