■ Education
Role models sought
Minister of Education Huang Jong-tsun (黃榮村) yesterday announced a campaign to find 100 outstanding public figures or successful businesspeople from various walks of life whose life stories could inspire students in their studies. Huang said students need more a diverse paradigm to emulate for their school careers in the light of the utilitarianism that has over-whelmed campuses. The 100 role models will travel nationwide to promote the idea of diligence. Wu Jing-jyi (吳靜吉), head of the Foundation for Scholarly Exchange presided over yesterday's news conference and announced that the Ministry of Interior, the National Youth Commission and the Council for Cultural Affairs will participate in the campaign.
■ Education
Dropouts face rejection
A survey released yesterday by the Humanistic Education Foundation (人本教育基金會) showed that the number of dropouts had reached 2,536 by the end of last month, while only 1,063 students returned to school during the past year. The rate of resumption of studies is only about 40 percent. The foundation said that about 70 percent of the drop-outs that social workers had helped return to school were then rejected by school authorities. Most schools do not welcome dropouts because they fear they will cause trouble to the other students. The foundation criticized this attitude and urged the Ministry of Education to enhance its supervision over the local schools to assure that dropouts have a right to resume their education.
■ Diplomacy
Tung pledges cooperation
Hong Kong Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa (董建華) said Thursday that the territory will try to improve its economic and cultural relations with Taiwan. When asked in a press conference to comment on a proposal to establish a free trade area between Hong Kong and Taiwan, Tung said he was pleased to see that Taiwan and Hong Kong have improved their relations in trade, investment, and tourism in the past six years. He said his government will be pleased to do anything that will improve these relations.
■ Crime
Police nab forgers
The Taipei Police yesterday arrested a fraud suspect and seized more than 300 semi-finished counterfeit credit cards. The suspect, Chiu Hung-ming (丘宏銘), was arrested when he picked up an express air parcel containing the cards. A spokesman for the Taipei Police Criminal Investigation Bureau said that, according to a preliminary investigation, the semi-finished counterfeit cards and related data of the original card owners were sent from Hong Kong, but the original card owners are people of the US, the UK and Australia. The faked cards will be sent to foreign countries after being finished in Taiwan. The police are trying to track down other members of the counterfeiting gang, he added.
■ Crime
Taiwanese student killed
A Taiwanese student who was studying music in Russia was killed in Tanbvy, the representative office of Taiwan in Moscow confirmed yesterday, CNA reported. The news agency did not provide any personal details about the victim, such as name, age, sex, or whether the student was the victim of foul play or an accident. However, the office also confirmed that a suspect was arrested, CNA said.
Thirty-five earthquakes have exceeded 5.5 on the Richter scale so far this year, the most in 14 years, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said on Facebook on Thursday. A large earthquake in Hualien County on April 3 released five times as much the energy as the 921 Earthquake on Sept. 21, 1999, the agency said in its latest earthquake report for this year. Hualien County has had the most national earthquake alerts so far this year at 64, with Yilan County second with 23 and Changhua County third with nine, the agency said. The April 3 earthquake was what caused the increase in
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is unlikely to attempt an invasion of Taiwan during US president-elect Donald Trump’s time in office, Taiwanese and foreign academics said on Friday. Trump is set to begin his second term early next year. Xi’s ambition to establish China as a “true world power” has intensified over the years, but he would not initiate an invasion of Taiwan “in the near future,” as his top priority is to maintain the regime and his power, not unification, Tokyo Woman’s Christian University distinguished visiting professor and contemporary Chinese politics expert Akio Takahara said. Takahara made the comment at a
DEFENSE: This month’s shipment of 38 modern M1A2T tanks would begin to replace the US-made M60A3 and indigenous CM11 tanks, whose designs date to the 1980s The M1A2T tanks that Taiwan expects to take delivery of later this month are to spark a “qualitative leap” in the operational capabilities of the nation’s armored forces, a retired general told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) in an interview published yesterday. On Tuesday, the army in a statement said it anticipates receiving the first batch of 38 M1A2T Abrams main battle tanks from the US, out of 108 tanks ordered, in the coming weeks. The M1 Abrams main battle tank is a generation ahead of the Taiwanese army’s US-made M60A3 and indigenously developed CM11 tanks, which have
CASE COUNT: The deceased had advised law enforcement agencies regarding 60 fraud cases this year, leading to the confiscation of NT$9.3 billion in alleged illegal proceeds Prosecutors yesterday launched an investigation into the death of cryptocurrency expert Miffy Chen (陳梅慧), who died in a car crash on Wednesday under what some consider to be suspicious circumstances following her work with law enforcement to track down NT$9.3 billion (US$286.97 million) in alleged illegal proceeds. Prosecutor-General Hsing Tai-chao (邢泰釗) tasked the Hsinchu District Prosecutors’ Office with investigating the incident following requests from the Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB) and other agencies with which she worked to crack several prominent cases involving financial fraud and money laundering. Chen was killed in a six-car pileup near Hsinchu in the northbound lanes of Sun
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