■ Electronics
Toshiba names president
Atsutoshi Nishida, a 30-year veteran at Toshiba Corp who served as an executive at the Japanese electronics maker's US operations, was appointed president yesterday. Nishida, 61, now a corporate executive vice president, will replace Tadashi Okamura, who will become chairman, the Tokyo-based company said in a statement. Chairman Taizo Nishimuro will step down to serve as adviser, it said. The appointments are subject to shareholders' approval in June. The company's board accepted Okamura's recommendation yesterday that Nishida succeed him, Toshiba said.
■ China's Economy
Consumer price rises slow
China's main measure of consumer prices rose 1.9 percent last month over the same month a year earlier, the smallest increase in 12 months, the government said yesterday. The report by the National Statistics Bureau suggests China's economic planners have made progress in curbing inflation, which hit a seven-year peak of 5.3 percent in July but has since subsided. The 1.9 percent increase last month in the consumer price index, China's main barometer for inflation, compared with a 2.4 percent year-on-year increase in December and a 3.2 percent on-year rise in January last year. China's consumer price index rose 3.9 percent on-year last year.
■ US Economy
Growth expected to slow
Economic growth will slow this year but will still be sufficient to reduce the nation's unemployment rate, business economists say. In its latest economic outlook, the National Association for Business Economics predicts the economy -- as measured by gross domestic product -- will expand by 3.6 percent this year and next. If the projections released yesterday prove accurate, that would mark a slowing from the 4.4 percent growth clocked last year, the strongest showing in five years. Forecasters anticipate that the unemployment rate -- which averaged 5.5 percent last year -- will dip to 5.2 percent this year and then to 5.1 percent next year.
■ Mobile Phones
Poll reveals younger users
Hong Kong's obsession with mobile phones has taken a new turn as a survey yesterday found a quarter of all phone owners were under 13 years old, with some as young as six. Sixty-seven percent of the 613 households interviewed by the Ming Pao Daily News said that family members under the age of 18 owned a mobile phone, with more than a quarter of them under 13 and 5.1 percent under six. Some 80 percent of the respondents said their youngsters used new handsets with only 20 percent using second-hand phones, the survey said.
■ Auto Market
Kia details stoppage costs
Kia Motors Corp, South Korea's second-largest automaker, said a labor dispute at one of its factories will cost it 48.5 billion won (US$48 million) in lost production. Production had stopped at its Hwasung factory for four non- consecutive days starting Feb. 16, Lee Sang-keun, a company spokesman said. The stoppage will affect 2,900 units including Sorento sport-utility vehicles and Cerato passenger cars, he said. "Workers are refusing to go back to work although the union has ordered them to do so," said Lee at the Seoul-based Kia. "We are worried this will affect exports." Details on the cause of the dispute were not immediately available.
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