CLEAN POLITICS: The president-elect emphasized the importance of having leaders set a good example and cited Singapore as a model for combating corruption
By Flora Wang
President-elect Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) stressed the importance of upholding government integrity as he met members of the incoming Cabinet during an orientation meeting yesterday.

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A DIFFERENT CASE: A KMT lawmaker defended Ma's decision, saying he would select competent people and not use the position as a system for rewarding his supporters
President-elect Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) plan to restore the appointment of senior advisers and national policy advisers to the president — a system that his Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) strongly disapproved of during the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration — has come under fire from the DPP.

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By Jenny W. Hsu
The next US administration is unlikely to make any groundbreaking move on the Taiwan issue, but the future of Taiwan-US relations remains promising, US academics said yesterday, while urging the incoming Taiwanese government to work on conveying a unified voice in Washington to consolidate support.

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President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) said yesterday he hoped that any joint statement issued from a meeting between the top Chinese and Japanese leaders this week would not jeopardize Taiwan’s sovereignty and interests.<

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AIRBORNE: Fifty to 60 percent of the mercury in Taiwan's air comes from China, EPA Minister Winston Dang said, adding that the US similarly suffers from China's pollution
By Meggie Lu
Environmental protection is without borders, and nations around the world are collaborating in air quality monitoring efforts to monitor pollutant density in the air, as well as to formulate possible ways to combat health and environmental hazards the pollutants are causing, the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) said yesterday.

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WORKING HARD: The FORMOSAT-2 satellite is expected to outlive its original mission life, serving for at least seven to eight years instead of the initially projected five
FORMOSAT-2, the second of the nation’s three meteorological satellites, has generated more than NT$200 million (US$6.5 million) in economic benefits since being launched on May 21, 2004, a senior official at the space program administration said yesterday.

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The Executive Yuan has selected three academics as the winners of the 2007 Executive Yuan Outstanding Contribution in Science and Technology Awards, government officials said yesterday.

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By Shelley Shan
Starting next Friday, passengers who change planes or make transit stops in Taiwan will be asked to observe the International Civil Aviation Organization’s (ICAO) safety inspection standards for liquids, aerosols and gels when they board with carry-on luggage.

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By Shelley Shan
The Department of Health said yesterday that it was considering a proposal to categorize multivitamins and other lower-dose vitamins as food.

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APPREHENSION: The World Taiwanese Congress defined 'status quo' as meaning that countries on both sides of the Strait are sovereign and do not belong to each other
By Charles Snyder
The governing body of the World Taiwanese Congress (WTC) demanded at a meeting on Sunday that president-elect Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) new government insist on the “one country on each side” of the Taiwan Strait principle when dealing with China and not abandon the move toward the “normalization” of Taiwan as a state.

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OFF THE RAILS: Police said the group transported around 100kg a month, using the High Speed Rail to deliver amphetamine and ketamine to pushers
Agents from the Ministry of Justice’s Investigation Bureau raided an underground drug factory in Taoyuan County late on Monday night and seized NT$20 million in illicit drugs, a spokesman for the bureau said yesterday.

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National Tsing Hua University in Hsinchu City inaugurated a Sun Yun-suan (孫運璿) Memorial Center on Monday in recognition of the contributions made by the late premier to the nation’s economic development.

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