■UNITED STATES
Biden defends stimulus plan
Vice President Joseph Biden yesterday defended a US$787 billion stimulus package adopted to jump-start the troubled US economy, but admitted recovery was a long way off. “We still have a long way to go, but clearly we are closer to recovery today than we were in January,” Biden wrote in an op-ed piece in the New York Times. “The Recovery Act has been critical to that progress.” “We need relief, recovery and reinvestment to cope with our multifaceted crisis — and only 159 days after it was signed by President [Barack] Obama, the Recovery Act is already at work providing all three.”
■CHINA
Internet users at 338 million
The number of Internet users in China is now greater than the entire population of the US, after rising to 338 million by the end of last month, state media reported yesterday. China’s online population, the largest in the world, rose by 40 million in the first six months of this year, Xinhua news agency reported, citing a report by the China Internet Network Information Center. The number of broadband Internet connections rose by 10 million to 93.5 million in the first half of the year, the report said. About 95 percent of townships were connected to broadband by early last month and 92.5 percent of villages had telephone lines that could be used for Internet access, Xinhua said, citing the official data.
■TOURISM
Spain expects 10% drop
Spain expects foreign tourist arrivals to drop by up to 10 percent this year because to the global economic downturn, Industry and Tourism Minister Miguel Sebastian told reporters after meeting with sector leaders in the holiday island of Palma de Mallorca. The decline is mostly the result of a sharp fall in the number of visitors from the UK, Spain’s main source of foreign visitors, because of the drop in the value of the pound and severe recession, he said. The number of foreign tourists who visited Spain fell 11.4 percent during the first half of this year over the same time last year to 23.6 million, government data released last week showed.
■SECURITIES
Schumer calls for ‘flash’ ban
Charles Schumer, the third-ranking Democrat in the US Senate, asked the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to ban so-called flash orders for stocks, saying they give high-speed traders an unfair advantage, according to a letter he sent to SEC Chairman Mary Schapiro on Friday. “This kind of unfair access seriously compromises the integrity of our markets and creates a two-tiered system, where a privileged group of insiders receives preferential treatment,” Schumer wrote in the letter. Flash orders make up less than 4 percent of US stock trading, Direct Edge and Bats said. Schumer, a member of the Senate Banking Committee, said he will introduce legislation to ban flash orders if the SEC doesn’t act on his request.
■ENERGY
Paraguay, Brazil end dispute
Brazil agreed on Saturday to triple the amount it pays Paraguay for energy from the massive Itaipu hydroelectric dam on their border, ending a long-running dispute that had soured relations between the two neighbors. Paraguay also won the right to gradually sell excess energy from the dam directly to the Brazilian market instead of doing so exclusively through state-owned power utility Eletrobras. That move will allow Paraguay to fetch more for the power at market prices.
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
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
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