■ Insurance
Samsung Life receives offer
A leading specialist US buyout fund has offered to buy a 17.6 percent stake in Samsung Life Insurance, South Korea's leading insurer, reports said yesterday. The offer came from Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, the world's largest buyout firm, Yonhap news agency said, citing an official at state debt guarantor, Seoul Guarantee Insurance. Creditors plan to sell their holdings, valued at 800 billion won (US$794 million), in Samsung Life this year. The stake in Samsung Life, the largest shareholder of microchip giant Samsung Electronics, is held by creditors as collateral for the debt of Samsung Motors. French carmaker Renault SA took over the car-making unit of South Korea's largest conglomerate Samsung Group in 2000.
■ Telecoms
TCL unit to buy out Alcatel
Chinese television and mobile phone maker TCL Communication Technology Holdings Ltd will buy back a 45 percent stake in a handset joint venture from France's Alcatel SA, parent company TCL Corp said yesterday. The deal, which represents a setback in TCL's ambitions to expand internationally, comes amid rising losses in the handset business due to intensifying competition from both domestic and international manufacturers. TCL Communication, whose shares are traded in Hong Kong, will issue new shares to buy out Alcatel's stake through a share swap valued at 63.34 million Hong Kong dollars (US$8.1 million), the company said in a statement. After the swap, Alcatel will hold a 4.76 percent share in the enlarged capital of TCL Communication.
■ Web security
Virus sends neo-Nazi spam
A computer virus spewed neo-Nazi-tinged spam in English and German into inboxes over the weekend. The virus, first spotted on Thursday, sends out a blast of e-mail to addresses found on infected PCs. Most of these messages contain links to news stories with content that "smells of right-wing political rhetoric," said Vincent Gullotto, vice president of McAfee Inc's antivirus emergency response team. But a small percentage contain links to a Web site that tries to infect visiting machines with the virus, he said. Among the many messages was one with the German subject line "60 Years of Freedom: Who's Celebrating?" referencing the end of World War II. One in English carried the subject: "Dresden Bombing Is To Be Regretted Enormously," referring to the Allied attack on the German city during World War II.
■ Publishing
Hollinger names new CEO
Hollinger Inc, the embattled Canadian holding company formerly led by Conrad Black, has announced the appointment of Paul Carroll as president and chief executive officer. Hollinger also said on Monday that Robert Metcalfe, who like Carroll has been an independent director of the company, will take the position of executive vice-president and chief operating officer. Gordon Walker remains non-executive chairman of the company, whose main asset is an interest in US newspaper publishing company Hollinger International Inc, which owns the Chicago Sun-Times. Carroll joined the Hollinger board last August. A lawyer by training, he was president and CEO of Carnarvon Capital Corp, a Toronto investment management and venture capital company.
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
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
CHINA REACTS: The patrol and reconnaissance plane ‘transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,’ the 7th Fleet said, while Taipei said it saw nothing unusual The US 7th Fleet yesterday said that a US Navy P-8A Poseidon flew through the Taiwan Strait, a day after US and Chinese defense heads held their first talks since November 2022 in an effort to reduce regional tensions. The patrol and reconnaissance plane “transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,” the 7th Fleet said in a news release. “By operating within the Taiwan Strait in accordance with international law, the United States upholds the navigational rights and freedoms of all nations.” In a separate statement, the Ministry of National Defense said that it monitored nearby waters and airspace as the aircraft
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