■ More sniffer dogs coming
Directorate General of Customs Chien Liang-chi (簡良機) said on Friday the number of sniffer dogs used by customs could increase to 80 within five to six years. Of the six sniffer dogs on active duty, Chien said two were with the Kaohsiung Customs Office, while the others were at the Taipei office. Chien praised the dogs' excellent performance in helping crack down on drug smuggling at airports. Kaohsiung Customs Office statistics showed that heroin, ketamine and amphetamine seized by customs officials accounted for 7.2 percent of all smuggled cargo seized during the first nine months of this year, making narcotics the third-largest smuggled items after tobacco/alcohol and Chinese agricultural products. The office attributes this to increasing demand for drugs, with the population of addicts rising for several years, officials said.
■ EVENTS
F4 holds tourism concert
A performance by local pop group F4 for approximately 5,000 fans from Japan and South Korea will be held at National Taiwan University's main stadium today, the Tourism Bureau said yesterday. Tourism officials said the fans would bring in at least NT$100 million (US$3 million) in revenue. The officials said the fans have come mostly on package tours, paying on average NT$20,000 apiece. In addition to the performance, fans will be taken to various scenic spots around the country. The bureau has also prepared limited edition notebooks and passport holders featuring the band members, as well as manuals on backpacking in Taiwan. Today's F4 performance will be the second sponsored by the Tourism Bureau, following on the success of the first one in April, which attracted 4,000 Japanese and 1,000 South Korean fans.
■ EVENTS
Whiz kids in Germany
Ten Taiwanese inventions will enter the Nuremberg International Invention Exhibition in Germany from Wednesday to Nov. 4. A 13-member Taiwanese delegation headed by inventor Teng Hung-chi (鄧鴻吉) -- dubbed "Taiwan's Edison" -- will depart for Germany on Tuesday. Teng expressed his gratitude to the central Taiwan office of the Ministry of Education for offering subsidies to the 13 junior high, senior high and college students for their overseas expenditures, including lodging, meals and airfare. All 13 students are expected to clinch medals for their creativity during competitions held alongside the exhibition, Teng said.
■ POLITICS
Ma promises MRT to Keelung
During a stopover in Keelung on his campaign trail yesterday, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said that if elected, he would expand the Neihu MRT line all the way to the harbor city. He also vowed to boost Keelung's economy by opening up direct links with China and open up tourism to Chinese tourists. "As your next president, I will increase the business opportunities at Keelung Harbor. I will also strengthen local tourism. My victory will be Keelung's prosperity," Ma said to a group of supporters. In a meeting with the media, Ma said that in the next five to 10 years, Keelung Harbor would play a vital role as a cargo transportation hub connecting both sides of the strait. The harbor should also play a strong role in attracting Chinese tourists, he said. Ma said expanding the Neihu MRT line to Keelung would connect the city to the science park chain that includes the Nangang Science Park and the Neihu Science Park.
Taiwan is awaiting official notification from the US regarding the status of the Agreement on Reciprocal Trade (ART) after the US Supreme Court ruled US President Donald Trump's global tariffs unconstitutional. Speaking to reporters before a legislative hearing today, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said that Taiwan's negotiation team remains focused on ensuring that the bilateral trade deal remains intact despite the legal challenge to Trump's tariff policy. "The US has pledged to notify its trade partners once the subsequent administrative and legal processes are finalized, and that certainly includes Taiwan," Cho said when asked about opposition parties’ doubts that the ART was
If China chose to invade Taiwan tomorrow, it would only have to sever three undersea fiber-optic cable clusters to cause a data blackout, Jason Hsu (許毓仁), a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator, told a US security panel yesterday. In a Taiwan contingency, cable disruption would be one of the earliest preinvasion actions and the signal that escalation had begun, he said, adding that Taiwan’s current cable repair capabilities are insufficient. The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) yesterday held a hearing on US-China Competition Under the Sea, with Hsu speaking on
LOUD AND PROUD Taiwan might have taken a drubbing against Australia and Japan, but you might not know it from the enthusiasm and numbers of the fans Taiwan might not be expected to win the World Baseball Classic (WBC) but their fans are making their presence felt in Tokyo, with tens of thousands decked out in the team’s blue, blowing horns and singing songs. Taiwanese fans have packed out the Tokyo Dome for all three of their games so far and even threatened to drown out home team supporters when their team played Japan on Friday. They blew trumpets, chanted for their favorite players and had their own cheerleading squad who dance on a stage during the game. The team struggled to match that exuberance on the field, with
The US’ joint strikes with Israel on Iran dismantled a key pillar of China’s regional strategy, removing an important piece in Beijing’s potential Taiwan Strait scenario, said Zineb Riboua, a senior researcher at the Hudson Institute’s Center for Middle East Peace and Security. In an article titled: “The Iran Question Is All About China,” Riboua said that understanding the Iran issue in the context of China’s “grand strategy” is essential to fully grasp the complexity of the situation. Beijing has spent billions of dollars over the years turning Iran into a “structural strategic asset,” diverting US military resources in the
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