SOCIETY
NT$20m lottery pot unveiled
Taiwan Lottery Co said the top prize in its scratch card games for the Lunar New Year would be a Super Red Envelope worth NT$20 million (US$648,025), while winners of the second prize would each get NT$2 million and a Mercedes-Benz A180 worth NT$1.58 million. As part of it efforts to boost sales ahead of the Lunar New Year in February, the company said it would also offer 300 prizes of NT$1 million, up from 200 last year. Three people would have a chance of winning the Super Red Envelope, while there would be five second prizes, Taiwan Lottery general manager Tsai Kuo-chi (蔡國基) said.
FOREIGN AFFAIRS
Indonesia halts program
Indonesia would temporarily stop sending students to universities in Taiwan, the Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Friday, after it asked Taipei to investigate media reports that up to 300 students were being forced to work in factories. The Southeast Asian nation sends students to Taiwan under a work-study program that allows them to do internships while studying. Officials said students under this scheme had “faced problems,” without providing details. “We have asked for an explanation … and for authorities to take steps needed to protect the interests and safety of these students,” ministry spokesman Armanatha Nasir said in a statement. The Taiwanese Ministry of Education said in a statement on Thursday that the media reports were not accurate and it found that no labor laws had been contravened after speaking to the students.
DISASTERS
Taipei shelter info available
Taipei residents should stay informed and be prepared to utilize the city’s 12 designated parks as emergency shelters in the event of a major disaster, the Taipei Fire Department said. Although the 600 copies of the public information calendar for this year have sold out, digital copies of the material is available on the Taipei City Disaster Prevention and Rescue Information Web site at http://www.eoc.gov.taipei/EOC/, it said. The calendar shows which city parks are designated emergency shelters with easy-to-understand illustrations, which city residents should familiarize themselves with, the department said. Those parks include Daan Forest Park (大安森林公園), Shilin Official Residence Park (士林官邸公園) and Dahu Park (大湖公園), which were selected because they are bigger than one hectare and situated near transportation networks, the department said.
CRIME
Indonesian nabbed for murder
Taichung police on Friday last week arrested an Indonesian man in connection with the death of a compatriot. The murder occurred at a roadside shed in Taichung in the early hours of Dec. 26, police said. The suspect, identified only by the name Vicky, allegedly stabbed another Indonesian called Ramadan in the back of the head with a knife, they said. Surveillance camera footage showed that the two Indonesian migrant workers had been drinking with several other friends, who called an ambulance after Ramadan was stabbed, police said, adding that Ramadan died on the way to the hospital. Investigators said they tracked the suspect to a fishing port in Chiayi County’s Budai Township (布袋), where he allegedly intended to leave the country illegally. Vicky was handed over to the Taichung District Prosecutors’ Office to be charged with homicide, police 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