■ Politics
Embassy planned in Nauru
The Republic of China's (ROC) embassy in Nauru is expected to be running by the end of the month, President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) said yesterday. The president made the remark while receiving Nauruan parliamentary speaker Valdon Dowiyogo at the Presidential Office yesterday morning. Taiwan and Nauru first established diplomatic relations in 1980. After Nauru switched its allegiance to China in July 2002, it re-established diplomatic relations with Taiwan in May 2005. Chen, who visited the Micronesian South Pacific island nation in September last year, was the first Taiwanese president to visit Nauru, which became independent in 1968.
■ Defense
Recruit standards change
The Ministry of National Defense yesterday made public the latest standards for the physical condition of recruits. Reporters immediately questioned whether the new standards were too lax. Recruits will be required to run 3km in 19 minutes. After six months of military service, the time limit will be 15 minutes. "I have to say that this standard for physical training is designed to help recruits gradually get used to tough military training," said Rear Admiral Wu Chi-fang (吳季方), spokesman for the ministry. "Every country in the world does the same thing to train their recruits. It will not be a problem."
■ Society
Weather kills mountaineer
The leader of a trio of mountaineers attempting to scale Mount Nanhu (南湖大山) and the Central Range Point has died after temperatures in the area suddenly dropped, said fire brigade officials who responded to an emergency call for help yesterday. The officials said they received emergency calls saying that the team's leader, Lai Shan-chieh (賴杉杰), had died while two companions -- Ting Ching-chun (丁清俊) and Chou Mei-chu (周美珠) -- were suffering from hypothermia. Ting and Chou are temporarily quartered at a tourist lodge in Nanhu while awaiting medical assistance. A seven-member rescue team has set off from the brigade's detachment near Lishan (梨山), but it will take them three to four days to reach the mountain lodge, officials said. The brigade requested a helicopter for the rescue mission, but bad weather conditions barred the option.
■ Justice
Task force members affirmed
Members of the country's top investigation task force have been approved by the Prosecutors' Personnel Review Committee under the Ministry of Justice (MOJ), an official of the Supreme Prosecutor's Office said yesterday. The 10 prosecutors were selected by State Public Prosecutor-General Chen Tsung-ming (陳聰明) and submitted to the ministry for approval earlier yesterday. Chen Yun-nan (陳雲南), who is currently an MOJ counselor, will be the task force head. The other nine members include another MOJ counselor and eight prosecutors from different high court and district prosecutors' offices. The spokesman said they would work directly under the leadership of the state public prosecutor-general and deal with crimes committed by top government officials or their relatives. The task force will start operating in April after the 10 members are officially appointed by the MOJ, the spokesman said.
■ Health
Taiwanese can't sleep
Over one-quarter of Taiwanese suffer from problems related to sleeping, including insomnia, with more women than men experiencing problems, a study published yesterday showed. The Taiwan Society of Sleep Medicine's survey of 4,011 people over 15 years of age found that 25.5 percent of respondents, or 4.8 million, had sleep-related problems. Increasing numbers of Taiwanese are troubled by a lack of sleep, it showed, with 24.8 percent reporting some manner of sleep disorder and 11.5 percent suffering chronic insomnia. The figures indicated that more than one in every 10 people regularly had serious difficulties sleeping. Thirty percent of women reported troubles falling asleep. More than half of women aged 50 to 59 reported menopause-related sleep problems, the survey found. Hsu Shih-chieh (許世杰) of Chang Gung Memorial Hospital in Linkou (林口) said that people who had trouble sleeping for more than one month might be suffering from chronic insomnia and should seek assistance from a physician.
■ Politics
Ma vows to ease restriction
Former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday said he would ease a key restriction on investment in China if elected president next year. "Generally speaking, the 40 percent ceiling has to go," Ma said of a rule subjecting Taiwanese companies' investment in China to that share of their net worth. Ma said there would be some exceptions to this liberalization. Speaking at a conference in Taipei organized by Merrill Lynch & Co, he said limits on some technology investments would need to be maintained for national security reasons, although they would be eased.
The Ministry of Education (MOE) is to launch a new program to encourage international students to stay in Taiwan and explore job opportunities here after graduation, Deputy Minister of Education Yeh Ping-cheng (葉丙成) said on Friday. The government would provide full scholarships for international students to further their studies for two years in Taiwan, so those who want to pursue a master’s degree can consider applying for the program, he said. The fields included are science, technology, engineering, mathematics, semiconductors and finance, Yeh added. The program, called “Intense 2+2,” would also assist international students who completed the two years of further studies in
Former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) departed for Europe on Friday night, with planned stops in Lithuania and Denmark. Tsai arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport on Friday night, but did not speak to reporters before departing. Tsai wrote on social media later that the purpose of the trip was to reaffirm the commitment of Taiwanese to working with democratic allies to promote regional security and stability, upholding freedom and democracy, and defending their homeland. She also expressed hope that through joint efforts, Taiwan and Europe would continue to be partners building up economic resilience on the global stage. The former president was to first
Former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on Monday called for greater cooperation between Taiwan, Lithuania and the EU to counter threats to information security, including attacks on undersea cables and other critical infrastructure. In a speech at Vilnius University in the Lithuanian capital, Tsai highlighted recent incidents in which vital undersea cables — essential for cross-border data transmission — were severed in the Taiwan Strait and the Baltic Sea over the past year. Taiwanese authorities suspect Chinese sabotage in the incidents near Taiwan’s waters, while EU leaders have said Russia is the likely culprit behind similar breaches in the Baltic. “Taiwan and our European
The Taipei District Court sentenced babysitters Liu Tsai-hsuan (劉彩萱) and Liu Jou-lin (劉若琳) to life and 18 years in prison respectively today for causing the death of a one-year-old boy in December 2023. The Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office said that Liu Tsai-hsuan was entrusted with the care of a one-year-old boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), in August 2023 by the Child Welfare League Foundation. From Sept. 1 to Dec. 23 that year, she and her sister Liu Jou-lin allegedly committed acts of abuse against the boy, who was rushed to the hospital with severe injuries on Dec. 24, 2023, but did not
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