■DEFENSE
Ma consoles Ting family
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) traveled to Hualien yesterday to pay his respects to fighter pilot Major Ting Shih-pao (丁世寶), who disappeared during a routine training flight in waters off the coast of the eastern county in early March. Ting’s body and the F-16A Fighting Falcon jet he was flying were never recovered despite an extensive search by the Coast Guard and the Ministry of National Defense, which dispatched several helicopters, aircraft, patrol ships and naval vessels to comb the area for days. Ma consoled Ting’s family members and presented a medal of honor for the lost pilot. Ma also promoted Ting to the rank of lieutenant colonel posthumously. Officials believe that the 34-year-old Ting, who had a total of more than 1,200 hours of flight time, lost his bearings during the training flight and crashed into the sea.
■CRIME
Police hunt for naked rider
Tainan police were looking for a man who rode his motorbike naked through the city’s main streets for one hour on Monday, local TV reports said yesterday. The man, aged between 30 and 40, wore only a helmet as he drove around in a light drizzle caused by Typhoon Jangmi, local cable TV stations TVBS and ETTV reported. Although most people stayed home because of the typhoon, many still saw the naked motorist and took photos with their phone cameras, the TV reports said, broadcasting a video clip that showed the man riding a motorbike and sometimes honking his horn. Police suspect the man is an exhibitionist and plan to charge him with public indecency, the TV reports said.
■CRIME
MOFA warns on Somalia
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday cautioned Taiwanese fishermen to stay away from the waters around Somalia after an Ukranian boat was seized by pirates in the region recently. The ministry said that despite the high security risk, many Taiwanese fishermen were attracted to Somalia and its surrounding region because of its fertile tuna hunting ground. A Taiwanese vessel was hijacked by Somalian pirates in November and was held for six months, ending with the payment of a high ransom. One Taiwanese crew member was killed during the ordeal.
■CRIME
Former envoy charged
The Control Yuan yesterday charged George Liu (劉寬平), the nation’s former representative to Switzerland, with dereliction of duty for delaying the delivery of a letter on an alleged money-laundering case involving the former first family. Control Yuan member Chao Jung-yao (趙榮耀) said that Liu’s office held the letter, in which the Federal Department of Justice and Police of the Swiss Confederation requested assistance from Taiwan in July to check the bank accounts of the son and daughter-in-law of former president Chen Shu-bian (陳水扁), for more than one week before sending it to Taipei via ordinary mail rather than sending an urgent telegram. The Swiss authorities were alerted by Merrill Lynch Bank (Suisse) earlier this year when the bank suspected Chen Chih-chung (陳致中) and his wife Huang Jui-ching (黃睿靚) of money laundering. “Liu had served as a legislator for three years before taking up the position in Switzerland ... He should have been very sensitive in this case,” Chao said. “His handlings were very inappropriate as it was not about the former president, but also the reputation of the Republic of China.”
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comment last year on Tokyo’s potential reaction to a Taiwan-China conflict has forced Beijing to rewrite its invasion plans, a retired Japanese general said. Takaichi told the Diet on Nov. 7 last year that a Chinese naval blockade or military attack on Taiwan could constitute a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan, potentially allowing Tokyo to exercise its right to collective self-defense. Former Japan Ground Self-Defense Force general Kiyofumi Ogawa said in a recent speech that the remark has been interpreted as meaning Japan could intervene in the early stages of a Taiwan Strait conflict, undermining China’s previous assumptions
Taiwan Railways Corp (TRC) today announced that Shin Kong Mitsukoshi has been selected as the preferred bidder to operate the Taipei Railway Station shopping mall, replacing the current operator, Breeze Development Co Ltd. Among eight qualified firms that delivered presentations and were evaluated by a review committee, Shin Kong Mitsukoshi was ranked first, while Breeze was named the runner-up, the rail company said in a statement. Contract negotiations are to proceed in accordance with regulations, it said, adding that if negotiations with the top bidder fail, it could invite the second-ranked applicant to enter talks. Breeze in a statement today expressed doubts over
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