A Paraguayan diplomat, who was removed from his post last week over allegations that he infected four Taiwanese women with a venereal disease, made public two health reports yesterday to try to prove that he was healthy.
Ruben Dario Benitez Palma presented the results of two medical exams at a news conference in Taipei. One of the check-ups was conducted before he left Paraguay to be stationed in Taiwan two years ago, while the other one was conducted Saturday at the Shin Kong Wu Ho-su Memorial Hospital in Taipei, which states that "there is no evidence of warts on external genitalia."
PHOTO: CNA
"Both reports indicate that there is no problem with my physical health and prove that the allegations against me were totally untrue," Benitez Palma said.
The case was first exposed last Thursday when a woman who claimed to be one of the victims held a press conference in the company of two PFP legislators.
The woman, who identified herself as "Miss A," accused the diplomat of knowingly infecting her with genital warts, or condyloma accuminata.
Three other women allegedly also contracted the disease from Benitez Palma after having sex with him, and one of them claimed to have attempted suicide after her complaints to the Paraguayan embassy were allegedly ignored.
The allegations, which were made during a high-profile visit by Paraguayan President Luis Angel Gonzalez Macchi to Taiwan last week, forced the Paraguay embassy to promptly remove Benitez Palma from his post.
PFP legislator Chin Huei-chu (
Chin said the diplomat's medical report at the Cathay General Hospital shows that he indeed had genital warts when he went there for a checkup in March last year.
PFP lawmaker Li Yong-ping (
Li also claimed last week that Benitez Palma had been fully aware of his health condition, as another one of the women accompanied him to the hospital for treatment. But the diplomat refused to receive treatment and started having sex with unknowing women, according to Li.
MOFA spokeswoman Katherine Chang (
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
RSS