■ CRIME
Tung Chia-ching released
The Taipei District Court yesterday extended the detention of Eastern Multimedia Group (EMG) chairman Gary Wang (王令麟) for another two months, but released EMG chief financial officer Tung Chia-ching (童家慶) on NT$6 million (US$193,548) bail. Wang and members of his family are suspected of embezzling NT$41.2 billion from EMG and the Rebar Asia Pacific Group. The prosecutors who indicted Wang recommended a 28-year sentence and a fine of NT$1 billion. Wang has been detained since June. Tung, who was indicted in the same case, faces a sentence of 16 years. He is barred from leaving the country or moving house and must report to his local police station every day.
■ POLITICS
Tibetans plan march
Tibetans and sympathetic groups, including the Taiwan-Tibet Exchange Foundation and the Taiwan Friends of Tibet, plan to hold a parade in Taipei tomorrow to mark the 49th anniversary of the Tibetan Uprising -- when Tibetans took to the streets of Lhasa on March 10, 1959, to protest Chinese occupation. Tens of thousands of Tibetans were massacred by the Chinese army in the months following the uprising, while the Dalai Lama and between 70,000 and 80,000 Tibetans escaped across the Himalayas to exile in India. The theme of this year's parade will be condemnation of human rights abuses in China-ruled Tibet, where activists say Tibetans endure torture, arrest, forced prostitution and execution. The event will begin at 1:30pm at the Guangfu S. Road entrance of Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall.
■ DEFENSE
Search for pilot continues
The air force said yesterday that the pilot of a missing F-16 could have been suffering from spatial disorientation before his jet fighter disappeared from radar screens. "Spatial disorientation can easily occur during a night flight," Yang Feng-sheng (楊鳳生), spokesman for the air force's 401st wing in Hualien, told a media conference yesterday. "When that happens, the pilot will become confused about direction." Major Ting Shih-pao's (丁世寶) F-16 disappeared during a routine night training exercise at approximately 7:16pm on Tuesday. The air force immediately launched a large-scale rescue mission focused on the aircraft's last recorded location. The navy dispatched several minesweepers to participate in the search yesterday. However, no sign of the plane or its pilot has been found. Yang said an initial investigation showed that Ting's F-16 performed an "abnormal" maneuver shortly before it disappeared.
■ TRANSPORT
Line to be electrified
The Railway Reconstruction Bureau said yesterday that it planned to electrify the railway section between Hualien and Taitung, a project which was approved by the Council of Economic Planning and Development last month. Bureau Deputy Director-General Chen Cheng-kai (陳正楷) said the section was about 155km in length and incorporated 30 stations. Currently, the single-track railway is used only by diesel-powered trains. Chen said the electrification of a new double-track railway on this section would allow for trains to operate at 130kph, up from 110kph, and reduce maximum traveling time to 35 minutes. The project has a budget of NT$15 billion (NT$483 million) and is scheduled to be completed within seven years, he said. It will involve the construction of four tunnels and the improvement of three bridges, Chen said.
■ SCIENCE
Physicist gets lofty award
Alex Chao (趙午), a physics professor and deputy head of the Department of Accelerator Research at Stanford University in the US, has been awarded the prestigious European Physical Society 2008 Accelerator Achievement Prize, Academia Sinica said yesterday. The award is conferred by the European Physical Society Accelerator Group, which will bestow the biannual honor on Chao at the European Particle Accelerator Conference in June. Chao, a Taiwan-trained physicist who received his bachelor's degree in physics from National Tsing Hua University in 1970, later studied in the US, where he currently resides. Chao was chosen for the award for his "many ground-breaking and fundamental contributions to accelerator physics and for the direct or indirect contribution to the design and performance of almost every major accelerator project, built or not built, over the past 30 years," the group said.
■ EDUCATION
Dutch scholarship offered
The Delta Foundation is offering NT$1.65 million (US$53,400) this year in scholarships to students who wish to study environmental protection in the Netherlands. Selected students will be offered NT$250,000 for a master's degree or NT$500,000 for a doctorate. Those who wish to apply must have a college degree or above from Taiwan, fluency in English (TOEFL 213 or above; or 5.5 on the IELTS) and a passion for environmental issues. They would also need to submit a 1,000-word essay on how they would utilize the degree to help environmental causes. The application deadline is May 15th.Visit www.neso-taipei.org.tw/Scholarship/Scholarship_Reg.aspx for more information.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫), spokeswoman Yang Chih-yu (楊智伃) and Legislator Hsieh Lung-chieh (謝龍介) would be summoned by police for questioning for leading an illegal assembly on Thursday evening last week, Minister of the Interior Liu Shyh-fang (劉世芳) said today. The three KMT officials led an assembly outside the Taipei City Prosecutors’ Office, a restricted area where public assembly is not allowed, protesting the questioning of several KMT staff and searches of KMT headquarters and offices in a recall petition forgery case. Chu, Yang and Hsieh are all suspected of contravening the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法) by holding
PRAISE: Japanese visitor Takashi Kubota said the Taiwanese temple architecture images showcased in the AI Art Gallery were the most impressive displays he saw Taiwan does not have an official pavilion at the World Expo in Osaka, Japan, because of its diplomatic predicament, but the government-backed Tech World pavilion is drawing interest with its unique recreations of works by Taiwanese artists. The pavilion features an artificial intelligence (AI)-based art gallery showcasing works of famous Taiwanese artists from the Japanese colonial period using innovative technologies. Among its main simulated displays are Eastern gouache paintings by Chen Chin (陳進), Lin Yu-shan (林玉山) and Kuo Hsueh-hu (郭雪湖), who were the three young Taiwanese painters selected for the East Asian Painting exhibition in 1927. Gouache is a water-based
Taiwan would welcome the return of Honduras as a diplomatic ally if its next president decides to make such a move, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said yesterday. “Of course, we would welcome Honduras if they want to restore diplomatic ties with Taiwan after their elections,” Lin said at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, when asked to comment on statements made by two of the three Honduran presidential candidates during the presidential campaign in the Central American country. Taiwan is paying close attention to the region as a whole in the wake of a
OFF-TARGET: More than 30,000 participants were expected to take part in the Games next month, but only 6,550 foreign and 19,400 Taiwanese athletes have registered Taipei city councilors yesterday blasted the organizers of next month’s World Masters Games over sudden timetable and venue changes, which they said have caused thousands of participants to back out of the international sporting event, among other organizational issues. They also cited visa delays and political interference by China as reasons many foreign athletes are requesting refunds for the event, to be held from May 17 to 30. Jointly organized by the Taipei and New Taipei City governments, the games have been rocked by numerous controversies since preparations began in 2020. Taipei City Councilor Lin Yen-feng (林延鳳) said yesterday that new measures by