■ Textiles
EU trade chief to visit China
EU trade chief Peter Mandelson is to head to China tomorrow to try to reach an accord on surging Chinese textile imports into the EU before a time-limit for imposing limits starts, a diplomat said yesterday. The EU has requested formal WTO talks with China on the issue, citing figures showing a big jump in Chinese imports of T-shirts and flax yarn into the EU following the end of a global textile quota system on Jan. 1. Separately, European imports of six categories of Chinese footwear leapt by 681 percent in the first four months of this year compared to the same period of last year, the EU's executive said yesterday.
■ Internet
iTunes overtakes rivals
Apple's iTunes online service has overtaken many "peer-to-peer" Web sites offering free music-swapping among US Internet users, but millions are still downloading unauthorized songs, a survey showed on Tuesday. The NPD Group said iTunes's pay-per-download store was tied with the file-swapping site LimeWire as the second most popular digital music service in March, each used by 1.7 million households. The most popular digital music service that month was the P2P site WinMX, used by 2.1 million households to download music. Paid music services from Napster and RealNetworks also placed in the top 10 alongside P2P services like iMesh and Kazaa. "These digital download stores appear to have created a compelling and economically viable alternative to illegal file sharing," said Russ Crupnick, president of the NPD Group's music and movies division.
■ Trade
Japanese firms worried
A third of Japanese companies with operations in China expect business there to sag in the aftermath of anti-Japan riots two months ago, according to a government study. The Japan External Trade Organization, a government-run agency that promotes trade, found that 151, or 36.5 percent, of the 414 Japanese companies surveyed last month forecast a fall in sales in China this year because of boycotts and a "tarnished image" for Japanese products. Forty companies, or 9.7 percent, said their sales are already shrinking. Although more than half of the companies said the protests had no apparent effect on their sales, 13 percent said they would rethink plans to invest in China or even move their factories to other countries, according to the survey, which was posted on the agency's Web site.
■ Airlines
ANA hikes surcharges
Japan's second-largest carrier All Nippon Airways (ANA) said yesterday it has raised surcharges on its international flights for a third time this year to cover high jet fuel costs. "Despite pursuing other avenues to combat increasing fuel prices, ANA is reluctantly compelled to ask passengers to again share the increasing burden," the airline said in a statement. For one-way flights from Japan's Narita to Europe, North America, South America and the Middle East, passengers will have to pay an additional ?2,500 (US$23.6 dollars), ANA said. For one-way flights from Narita to Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia, ?1,800 was added to the cost, with Hong Kong flights having to pay ?700. The company said it would cancel the latest surcharges if the average monthly spot price of Singapore jet fuel fell below US$40 a barrel. Jet fuel currently trades at around US$65 dollars a barrel in Singapore.
RETHINK? The defense ministry and Navy Command Headquarters could take over the indigenous submarine project and change its production timeline, a source said Admiral Huang Shu-kuang’s (黃曙光) resignation as head of the Indigenous Submarine Program and as a member of the National Security Council could affect the production of submarines, a source said yesterday. Huang in a statement last night said he had decided to resign due to national security concerns while expressing the hope that it would put a stop to political wrangling that only undermines the advancement of the nation’s defense capabilities. Taiwan People’s Party Legislator Vivian Huang (黃珊珊) yesterday said that the admiral, her older brother, felt it was time for him to step down and that he had completed what he
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