DIPLOMACY
Hualien establishes ties
The Hualien City Government and Morioka, the capital of Iwate Prefecture in northern Japan, on Sunday signed an agreement establishing friendship relations. Hualien Mayor Wei Chia-hsien (魏嘉賢) signed the agreement with Morioka Mayor Hiroaki Tanifuji in Taiwan. The agreement marks another achievement for Hualien in expanding its city diplomacy after it established sister-city relations with the Japanese town of Takachiho last month, Wei said. Hualien and Morioka began conducting exchanges in 2000, Wei said. Through the agreement, the two cities pledge to deepen people-to-people friendship and develop permanent good relations through tourism, and industrial and cultural exchanges, he added.
FOOD
Taiwan wins chocolate gold
Taiwanese brand Fuwan Chocolate has won five gold, 19 silver and four bronze medals at the International Chocolate Awards’ 2019 World Final event held on Monday last week in Guatemala, the organizers have said. A tea-flavored chocolate bar named “Taiwan No. 1” that contains 62 percent cocoa grown in Pingtung County was the biggest winner in the annual competition, clinching three gold medals, according to an announcement following the competition. Fuwan also won gold medals in two categories for flavored dark chocolate bars, including Taiwan Tie-Guan-Yin Tea Chocolate, containing 62 percent cocoa, and Taiwan Magao, or wild pepper, chocolate, also containing 62 percent cocoa. Another Taiwanese brand, Zeng Zhiyuan Chocolate, also from Pingtung, won two gold, six silver and one bronze medal with its dark chocolates. Overall, more than a dozen Taiwanese chocolate brands won awards.
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,
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