WEATHER
Plum rain front expected
The first plum rain front of the season is to reach Taiwan tomorrow, so people should beware of sudden downpours, the Central Weather Bureau said on Sunday. The weather across Taiwan today is expected to be mostly cloudy, with warm daytime temperatures, except in mountainous areas in eastern and southeastern regions, where sporadic afternoon showers can be expected, the bureau said. With the arrival of the first plum rain this year, showers and thunderstorms would prevail across the nation, and that pattern would continue through Thursday, it said. Sporadic showers would continue into Friday and Saturday in eastern Taiwan, while other areas would have mostly cloudy skies with brief afternoon thundershowers, it said.
SOCIETY
Solar halo reported
A solar halo was visible above Taitung County on Sunday from about 11am until midday, with colored rings enclosing the sun. Thousands of people took photographs of the phenomenon that were posted on social media. One netizen posted a photo of his face in the center of the halo. A couple formed a heart with their arms stretched toward the sun, with the halo as a background. A solar halo is caused by ice crystals suspended in the atmosphere refracting sunlight, which results in colored or white rings around the sun, the Taitung Weather Station said, adding that they are usually seen in spring or summer. Some have said that a solar halo signals rain at night, but a weather expert said that such a link has no scientific basis. A solar halo was also reported in Japan’s Mie, Gifu and Nagano prefectures. As the phenomenon occurred shortly before the start of the Reiwa imperial era tomorrow, it was seen as a good omen, the reports said, citing Japanese folklore.
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
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LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods