■ earthquakes
Twelve tremors hit nation
The nation was struck by 12 undersea earthquakes yesterday, including a powerful one in the east, but there were no reports of damage or casualties, the earthquake center said yesterday. The first quake, measuring 5.9 on the Richter scale occurred at 2:28am, shaking Taitung County. The second tremor struck 24 minutes later with a magnitude of 4.3 near Chengkung (成功) in Taitung, the center said. Ten other quakes, measuring more than 4 on the Richter scale, including one with a magnitude of 5.4 and another of 5.2, rocked the eastern county between 3:33am and 9:04am, it said. There were no reports of damage or casualties, the center and police said.
■ politics
Cabinet doesn’t need DPP
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairman Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) said yesterday he did not think that the incoming Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) administration, which is a majority government, needed to recruit DPP members to the new Cabinet, emphasizing that cooperation between political parties should focus on policy. Hsieh made the remarks in response to a report published in yesterday’s Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) that DPP legislators had expressed reservations on the possible recruitment of Straits Exchange Foundation Vice Chairman Hong Chi-chang (洪奇昌) to the new Cabinet. Dismissing the possibility as hypothetical, Hsieh said the question concerned personal desire and that his party would not begin considering such a possibility until the KMT administration officially made an announcement. Hong last night denied that he would join the new Cabinet, saying he would resign along with the other members of the current Cabinet before May 20.
■ crime
Fine, but no jail for Wu
The Tainan branch of the Taiwan High Court yesterday converted Tainan County Council Speaker Wu Chien-pao’s (吳健保) five-month jail sentence for gambling into a fine, adding that the verdict was not subject to appeal. A spokesperson for the Tainan District Prosecutors’ Office, which meted out the jail sentence on April 10, said the office found the verdict regrettable but respected it. Wu ran several gambling houses in Tainan County between 2004 and 2005. On one occasion, then Tainan County deputy council speaker Kuo Hsiu-chu (郭秀珠) lost more than NT$80 million during a 10-day period. Wu was indicted on gambling charges by Tainan prosecutors. The decision on a second appeal issued on Feb. 2 this year said that Wu could pay a fine instead of serving jail time. The Tainan Prosecutors’ Office, however, decided not to allow Wu to substitute the jail sentence for a fine of NT$137,700, and instead sent Wu directly to jail. Wu immediately filed an appeal, with the High Court ruling in favor of a fine.
■ politics
No invitation for Chen yet
President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) has not yet decided whether to attend president-elect Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) inauguration on May 20 because he has not received an invitation, the Presidential Office said yesterday. The Presidential Office issued a statement dismissing a recent TVBS report that claimed Chen had turned down the invitation because it was customary for Chen to do volunteer work on inauguration day. “There is considerable discrepancy between fact and the report,” the statement said. In response, Ma’s spokesman Lo Chih-chiang (羅智強) said yesterday that Ma’s office would send out the invitations, including Chen’s, after finalizing the guest list.
‘OBNOXIOUS MAN’: The KMT’s Chen Ching-hui moved into Chung Chia-pin’s path atop the podium and reached for him before he grabbed at her legs with both hands Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chung Chia-pin (鍾佳濱) yesterday said he slipped and lost his balance, and did not know who was around him, after jumping onto the speaker’s podium at the legislature in Taipei. He apologized after a collision with Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Chen Ching-hui (陳菁徽), who moved to intercept him as he mounted the podium. There was pushing and shoving when the session started in the morning as KMT lawmakers attempted to block access to the podium to shield Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) so he could preside over the session. Video footage showed Chung step on a chair and
While it is common to see bumper stickers informing other drivers about important information, such as “baby on board” or “rookie driver,” some motorist in Taiwan are using creative statements to warn other drivers to keep a safe distance to avoid a collision. A photograph recently circulating on the Internet showed a van in Changhua City with a bumper sticker saying that the driver received their license after taking the test three times, so it is dangerous to drive close to the vehicle. The person who took the photograph said all vehicles behind the van appeared to “subconsciously” maintaining a safe distance. Some
Taipei police on Saturday arrested 24 female Thai tourists on suspicion of working as hostesses and engaging in illegal activities at an underground bar in Zhongshan District (中山), the distict’s police precinct said in a statement yesterday. The police also arrested five other people involved in the operation, including the 29-year-old bar owner surnamed Chiang (蔣), and 17 customers, the statement said. The 24 Thai women were fined an undisclosed amount in accordance with the Social Order Maintenance Act (社會秩序維護法) by the police and transferred to a National Immigration Agency (NIA) special brigade in Taipei for repatriation to Thailand. The cases of
A female physician at New Taipei City’s Shuang Ho Hospital was bullied and made to work for 32 consecutive hours by a senior colleague while pregnant before later having a miscarriage, an internal investigation found, the hospital said on Monday. The perpetrator has been removed from his post, the hospital said. The attending physician in the hospital’s Medical Imaging Department, identified by the pseudonym Y, earlier on Monday told reporters that she had been bullied by a male senior colleague who arranged shifts in her department. In January, shortly after she became pregnant, Y asked the department director if she could avoid overnight