■ POLITICS
KMT names appointments
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) revealed the names of five Cabinet members appointed to its Central Standing Committee (CSC) yesterday: Cabinet Secretary-General Hsueh Hsiang-chuan (薛香川), Minister of the Interior Liao Liou-yi (廖了以), Minister of Finance Lee Sush-der (李述德), Minister of Economic Affairs Yiin Chii-ming (尹啟銘) and Minister of Transportation and Communications Mao Chi-kuo (毛治國). The appointments will enhance cooperation between the party and the government, the KMT said. KMT Spokesman Lee Chien-jung (李建榮) said the five designated CSC members would attend the CSC’s weekly meetings starting next week. The KMT began inviting Cabinet members to CSC meetings earlier this year.
■ POLITICS
Taisugar official to resign
Taiwan Sugar Corp chairman Wu Rong-ming (吳容明) yesterday reiterated his intention to resign, saying he wanted to express dissatisfaction at the Cabinet’s decision to promote Chen Ching-bin (陳清彬) to company president. Wu said that under the rules governing state-owned enterprises, a candidate for president should be recommended by the chairman to the Cabinet. Wu said he had recommended Chi Tsung-chi (紀聰吉), a land management professor at Feng Chia University, but that the Cabinet violated the system to choose Chen. In response, the Cabinet said it would respect the final decision of Minister of Economic Affairs Yiin Chii-ming (尹啟銘) after he returns from the APEC forum in Peru.
■ HEALTH
Official encourages flu shots
The Department of Health yesterday called for those at high risk of catching influenza to get free flu vaccines before the end of the month. Centers for Disease Control Deputy Director General Lin Ting (林頂) said the remaining stock of free flu shots should be given to those who are vulnerable to influenza before being offered to others next month. Lin said senior citizens, children between the ages of six months and three years, elementary students in the first to fourth grades, medical professionals, those who live in nursing homes or other care facilities and poultry workers should get the shots. He said that the centers had purchased 3.2 million doses this year, of which 700,000 shots remained as of Monday. “Due to the enthusiastic response to the offer, only around 610,000 shots for adults and around 80,000 shots for children are left,” he said. He estimated that when the shots are offered to the public on Monday there will be around 600,000 shots left. The CDC estimated the influenza outbreak this year would peak in early January. As it takes about two weeks for a flu shot to build protection, Lin urged the public to get shots no later than the middle of next month.
■ CRIME
Smuggled goods seized
The Keelung Customs mobile inspection brigade seized 11,250kg of smuggled herbicide, it said yesterday. The seized herbicide, Nitrofen, which is primarily used by growers of rice and certain vegetables to control broadleaf weeds and grasses, has an estimated market value of NT$30 million (US$1 million), the office said. It said the team had inspected a shipment of 45 drums allegedly containing an organic surface active agent because it suspected that the bottom of the drums contained a solid material. The team drilled holes in the bottom of the barrels with the consent of the importer and discovered they concealed Nitrofen. Officials are continuing to investigate the case.
■ CRIME
Fake credit cards seized
Customs officials at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport seized 201 fake credit cards from a Taiwanese passenger returning from Macau last Thursday, the Taipei Customs Office said on Monday. The credit cards were discovered when the passenger, surnamed Liao, was passing through customs. Considering it abnormal for a passenger to carry so many credit cards, the officials decided to request help from the National Credit Card Center to determine whether the cards were fake, the customs office said. After a verification process lasting several days, the center reported that all the cards were fake, although they appeared to be issued by various well-known banks, including the Bank of East Asia in Hong Kong, the DBS Bank of Singapore and two British banks, Standard Chartered Bank and HSBC.
■ NAVAL
Gutted ship towed back
A Taiwanese fishing boat found empty and gutted by fire in the South Pacific was being towed back to Taiwan for investigation after hopes faded of finding its 29 crew members alive, an official said yesterday. The scorched shell of the Tai Ching 21 was found near Kiribati on Nov. 9 with no sign of the crew members — from Taiwan, China, Indonesia and the Philippines — or its three life rafts and one lifeboat. A New Zealand Air Force Orion airplane spent more than 30 hours searching 54,000km² of ocean in the central Pacific north of Fiji, but found nothing. The air search was suspended on Saturday. Fiji Navy Warrant Officer Anare Rasunusunu said the boat was being towed back to Taiwan, and “from there they will make an assessment and investigation.”
TRAGEDY: An expert said that the incident was uncommon as the chance of a ground crew member being sucked into an IDF engine was ‘minuscule’ A master sergeant yesterday morning died after she was sucked into an engine during a routine inspection of a fighter jet at an air base in Taichung, the Air Force Command Headquarters said. The officer, surnamed Hu (胡), was conducting final landing checks at Ching Chuan Kang (清泉崗) Air Base when she was pulled into the jet’s engine for unknown reasons, the air force said in a news release. She was transported to a hospital for emergency treatment, but could not be revived, it said. The air force expressed its deepest sympathies over the incident, and vowed to work with authorities as they
A tourist who was struck and injured by a train in a scenic area of New Taipei City’s Pingsi District (平溪) on Monday might be fined for trespassing on the tracks, the Railway Police Bureau said yesterday. The New Taipei City Fire Department said it received a call at 4:37pm on Monday about an incident in Shifen (十分), a tourist destination on the Pingsi Railway Line. After arriving on the scene, paramedics treated a woman in her 30s for a 3cm to 5cm laceration on her head, the department said. She was taken to a hospital in Keelung, it said. Surveillance footage from a
Police have issued warnings against traveling to Cambodia or Thailand when others have paid for the travel fare in light of increasing cases of teenagers, middle-aged and elderly people being tricked into traveling to these countries and then being held for ransom. Recounting their ordeal, one victim on Monday said she was asked by a friend to visit Thailand and help set up a bank account there, for which they would be paid NT$70,000 to NT$100,000 (US$2,136 to US$3,051). The victim said she had not found it strange that her friend was not coming along on the trip, adding that when she
INFRASTRUCTURE: Work on the second segment, from Kaohsiung to Pingtung, is expected to begin in 2028 and be completed by 2039, the railway bureau said Planned high-speed rail (HSR) extensions would blanket Taiwan proper in four 90-minute commute blocs to facilitate regional economic and livelihood integration, Railway Bureau Deputy Director-General Yang Cheng-chun (楊正君) said in an interview published yesterday. A project to extend the high-speed rail from Zuoying Station in Kaohsiung to Pingtung County’s Lioukuaicuo Township (六塊厝) is the first part of the bureau’s greater plan to expand rail coverage, he told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). The bureau’s long-term plan is to build a loop to circle Taiwan proper that would consist of four sections running from Taipei to Hualien, Hualien to
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