After Taipei Zoo received two giant pandas from China on Tuesday, another zoo said yesterday that it is seeking a pair.
Leofoo Village Theme Park in Hsinchu, which applied to house the two Chinese pandas but lost out to Taipei Zoo, said it hoped that China would give Taiwan another pair of the animals.
“We have built the panda enclosure and three keepers have received training in China. We have made all the preparations,” Yuan Hsiang-chieh (袁相杰), director of the theme park, told Deutsche Presse-Agentur by phone.
PHOTO: CHIEN JUNG-FENG, TAIPEI TIMES
Local press reports said China had hinted it could give Taiwan more pandas. Yuan said the Leofoo park will make inquiries after the Lunar New Year.
“The new year is coming up and then there are the Lunar New Year holidays, so it is not the right time to ask about that [the pandas] but we will make inquiries after the Lunar New Year,” he said.
This year’s Lunar New Year falls on Jan. 26.
After Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) offered two pandas to Taiwan in 2005, Taipei Zoo and the Leofoo park applied to house them.
The Council of Agriculture rejected the application from the theme park, saying its medical facilities for pandas and tourist education programs were not as good as those of the Taipei Zoo.
In related news, the first cross-strait charter flight leaving from China’s Chengdu arrived at Taipei’s Songshan Airport yesterday.
Chengdu is one of the Chinese airports opened to Taiwan flights after the second meeting between Straits Exchange Foundation chairman Chiang Pin-kung (江丙坤) and China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林) in October.
The Sichuan Airlines flight landed at 4:15pm. The airport hosted a water-spraying ceremony for the flight, which carried 87 passengers.
The flight attendants served passengers wearing traditional costumes. Two of the flight attendants also wore panda suits.
The pandas in Taipei Zoo came from the panda-breeding center in Sichuan Province.
To thank the people of Taiwan for their support after the Sichuan earthquake in May, Sichuan Airlines also painted “People in Sichuan thank our fellow citizens in Taiwan” (四川人民感謝台灣同胞) in Chinese on the aircraft.
Taipei has once again made it to the top 100 in Oxford Economics’ Global Cities Index 2025 report, moving up five places from last year to 60. The annual index, which was published last month, evaluated 1,000 of the most populated metropolises based on five indices — economics, human capital, quality of life, environment and governance. New York maintained its top spot this year, placing first in the economics index thanks to the strength of its vibrant financial industry and economic stability. Taipei ranked 263rd in economics, 44th in human capital, 15th in quality of life, 284th for environment and 75th in governance,
The Sports Administration yesterday demanded an apology from the national table tennis association for barring 17-year-old Yeh Yi-tian (葉伊恬) from competing in the upcoming World Table Tennis (WTT) United States Smash tournament in Las Vegas this July. The sports agency said in a statement that the Chinese Taipei Table Tennis Association (CTTTA) must explain to the public why it withdrew Yeh from the WTT tournament in Las Vegas. The sports agency said it contacted the association to express its disapproval of the decision-making process after receiving a complaint from Yeh’s coach, Chuang
Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) tendered his resignation last night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by media. His resignation was immediately accepted by the Control Yuan. In a statement explaining why he had resigned, Lee apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon on May 20. The issue first came to light late last month, when TVBS News reported that Lee had instructed his driver to take the dog to the salon. The news channel broadcast photos that it said were taken by an unnamed whistle-blower, which purportedly showed the
A former officer in China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) who witnessed the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre has warned that Taiwan could face a similar fate if China attempts to unify the country by force. Li Xiaoming (李曉明), who was deployed to Beijing as a junior officer during the crackdown, said Taiwanese people should study the massacre carefully, because it offers a glimpse of what Beijing is willing to do to suppress dissent. “What happened in Tiananmen Square could happen in Taiwan too,” Li told CNA in a May 22 interview, ahead of the massacre’s 36th anniversary. “If Taiwanese students or
RSS