The UN refugee agency yesterday welcomed an EU decision on the region’s migrant crisis, but said much more needs to be done, including “concrete commitments” by member states.
European leaders argued into the early hours yesterday over how to handle the crisis in the Mediterranean, agreeing to a plan to distribute the care of desperate people fleeing war and poverty in north Africa and the Middle East.
They eventually agreed to a voluntary scheme aimed at taking in 60,000 people and granted an exclusion for Hungary, which had earlier described the plan as absurd, and Bulgaria, one of the EU’s poorest countries.
Photo: AFP
“This clearly is an important step along the way to finding answers to this crisis, but clearly, much more will have to be done, including addressing the root causes,” UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) spokesman Adrian Edwards told a news briefing.
The agreement is to relocate 40,000 asylum seekers now in Italy and Greece who are in need of international protection and “the participation of all member states will be key to success,” Edwards said.
“With regard to the proposal for EU-wide resettlement of 20,000 refugees, UNHCR urges member states to make concrete commitments towards this goal,” Edwards said.
“There does need to be a joined up response by Europe focused on the asylum priorities,” he added.
‘REGRETTABLE’: TPP lawmaker Vivian Huang said that ‘we will continue to support Chairman Ko and defend his innocence’ as he was transferred to a detention facility The Taipei District Court yesterday ruled that Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) be detained and held incommunicado over alleged corruption dating to his time as mayor of Taipei. The ruling reversed a decision by the court on Monday morning that Ko be released without bail. After prosecutors on Wednesday appealed the Monday decision, the High Court said that Ko had potentially been “actively involved” in the alleged corruption and ordered the district court to hold a second detention hearing. Ko did not speak to reporters upon his arrival at the district court at about 9:10am yesterday to attend a procedural
Thirty Taiwanese firms, led by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光投控), yesterday launched a silicon photonics industry alliance, aiming to accelerate the medium’s development and address the energy efficiency of artificial intelligence (AI) devices like data centers. As the world is ushering in a new AI era with tremendous demand for computing power and algorithms, energy consumption is emerging as a critical issue, TSMC vice president of integrated interconnect and packaging business C.K. Hsu (徐國晉) told a media briefing in Taipei. To solve this issue, it is essential to introduce silicon photonics and copackaged optics (CPO)
BACK IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD: The planned transit by the ‘Baden-Wuerttemberg’ and the ‘Frankfurt am Main’ would be the German Navy’s first passage since 2002 Two German warships are set to pass through the Taiwan Strait in the middle of this month, becoming the first German naval vessels to do so in 22 years, Der Spiegel reported on Saturday. Reuters last month reported that the warships, the frigate Baden-Wuerttemberg and the replenishment ship Frankfurt am Main, were awaiting orders from Berlin to sail the Strait, prompting a rebuke to Germany from Beijing. Der Spiegel cited unspecified sources as saying Beijing would not be formally notified of the German ships’ passage to emphasize that Berlin views the trip as normal. The German Federal Ministry of Defense declined to comment. While
The High Court yesterday overturned a Taipei District Court decision to release Taiwan People’s Party Chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) and sent the case back to the lower court. The Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office on Saturday questioned Ko amid a probe into alleged corruption involving the Core Pacific City development project during his time as Taipei mayor. Core Pacific City, also known as Living Mall (京華城購物中心), was a shopping mall in Taipei’s Songshan District (松山) that has since been demolished. On Monday, the Taipei District Court granted a second motion by Ko’s attorney to release him without bail, a decision the prosecutors’ office appealed
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