■ Airline
China Air to sell shares
Flagship carrier Air China is on schedule with plans to sell shares to foreign investors later this year, a government newspaper reported yesterday citing an airline official. "The company is to be listed in Hong Kong at around the end of this year, but there are no further details I can provide at the moment," Wang Jie, Air China's Shanghai branch general manager, was quoted as saying by the China Daily on its Web site. State newspapers reported in March that Air China had chosen Merrill Lynch and China International Capital Corp as advisers for an initial public offering that will seek to raise US$500 million.
■ Automakers
Mitsubishi plans job cuts
Troubled Mitsubishi Motors Corp may cut more than 10 percent of its 13,700-strong workforce as part of restructuring measures, a daily said yesterday. The possible job cuts are in line with Mitsubishi's plan to streamline its domestic operations, the Tokyo Shimbun daily said. Mitsubishi Motors is working on a major restructuring plan with help from Mitsubishi group firms after its top shareholder, DaimlerChrysler, announced last month it would not offer any new financial aid to the money-losing car maker. The car maker has been hit by slumping sales in the key North American market, heavy debt and recall scandals and is expected to announce the restructuring plan on May 21, the business daily Nihon Keizai Shimbun reported Saturday.
■ Interest rates
S Korea to avoid rise
Record oil prices may not prompt an increase in key interest rates, South Korean Finance Minister Lee Hun-jai said, echoing Saturday's comments by the central bank governor. "I agree with the central bank governor, who said it's not desirable to absorb cost-push inflation through adjusting interest rates," Lee said during the annual meeting of the Asian Development Bank in Jeju, South Korea. "We'll try so that even if higher oil prices affect local prices, the Bank of Korea won't need to change interest rates because of that," Lee said. South Korea needs low borrowing costs to revive business and consumer spending. Central bank Governor Park Seung said on Saturday that interest rates aren't an effective tool to control inflation caused by oil prices or other external factors, suggesting the bank will keep its key rate at a record-low 3.75 percent.
■ Televisions
China to protest US ruling
Sichuan Changhong Electric Co (四川長紅) and other television makers may fight a US ruling to impose import duties on their exports to America, Beijing Star Daily said on its Web site, citing company officials it didn't identify. Sichuan Changhong, Konka Group Co (康佳) and TCL Holding Co will consult their lawyers and China Chamber of Commerce for Import and Export of Machinery and Electronic Products about appealing against the ruling, the report said. Televisions from China will face import duties of as much as 78 percent after the US International Trade Commission ruled that cheaper Chinese products are hurting the US industry and threatening 3,993 American workers. The commission ruled 5-0 that Chinese companies must pay the duties on the US$276 million worth of televisions they ship to the US, a decision contested by US retailers such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
RESTAURANT POISONING? Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang at a press conference last night said this was the first time bongkrekic acid was detected in Taiwan An autopsy discovered bongkrekic acid in a specimen collected from a person who died from food poisoning after dining at the Malaysian restaurant chain Polam Kopitiam, the Ministry of Health and Welfare said at a news conference last night. It was the first time bongkrekic acid was detected in Taiwan, Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang (王必勝) said. The testing conducted by forensic specialists at National Taiwan University was facilitated after a hospital voluntarily offered standard samples it had in stock that are required to test for bongkrekic acid, he said. Wang told the news conference that testing would continue despite
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)