■ Banking
Seoul warns about loans
South Korea's central bank said yesterday that compe-tition to increase lending was eroding the profitability of South Korean banks. At the end of September last year, outstanding loans extended by banks rose to 528.7 trillion won (US$446 billion), compared to 525 trillion won in deposits, according to the Bank of Korea. Excessive lending has lowered capital adequacy ratios, a key measure of financial health, it said. The loan-to-deposit ratio has increased from 81.6 percent in 2001 to 92.2 percent in 2002 and 100.7 percent last year, the central bank said. The increase means banks have bor-rowed money at higher interest rates to cover cash shortages, it said. South Korean banks suffered a slump in profits last year due to exposure to a mountain of credit card and household debt.
■ Aviation
British Airways cutting jobs
British Airways, Europe's No. 1 airline, will cut thousands of jobs as part of plans to reduce costs by ?300 million (US$540 million) a year, the London- based Sunday Times said, citing unidentified people at the company. The job losses will be announced when the airline presents its new business plan at the end of the month, according to the newspaper. British Airways chief executive officer Rod Eddington has lowered costs, grounding a fleet of supersonic Concorde planes in October and cutting 12,087 jobs since 2001. Eddington said in the car-rier's employee news-paper earlier this month that the airline must cut its debt and pension deficit, improve security and reduce costs this year to achieve a 10 percent operating margin.
■ Environment
Recycling plant for Thailand
Japan's Fuji Xerox Co Ltd plans to establish a network to recycle its copiers, printers and other products used in nine Asian-Pacific economies, a press report said yesterday. Under the plan, the major copier and printer maker would build and start up a recycling plant in Thailand in Septem-ber at a cost of about Y?400 million (US$3.8 million dollars), the business daily Nihon Keizai Shimbun said. It would be the first overseas recycling base for the company, a joint venture between Japan's Fuji Photo Film Co and Britain's Xerox Ltd, the report said. The company has been repro-cessing data-processing and electronics products at home. The Thai plant would reprocess 99.8 percent or more of the materials used in its pro-ducts discarded in South Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand and Thailand, the report said. The construction of the plant, which would be capable of dismantling and reprocessing 30,000 copiers and 400,000 toner cartridges a year, was due to begin this month, Nihon Keizai said.
■ Automobiles
Honda builds R&D plant
Honda Motor Co is building a research and development facility to develop auto-mobile engines, including hybrids powered by electri-city, that use less fuel than current models, the Nikkei English News reported. The facility, located in Tochigi prefecture, north of Tokyo, will be completed by the end of this month, the report said, citing company executives it didn't name. Honda plans to develop fuel-efficient internal-combustion systems that are lighter than current ones, as well as hybrid engines, the Nikkei said, citing the executives.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique