■ CRIME
Fake bags prove costly
The Intellectual Property Court ruled that a woman must pay Hermes International SCA NT$256 million (US$7.5 million) for selling four fake Hermes handbags, local media reported yesterday. The amount is the highest compensation sought by the court in a violation of intellectual property rights, reports said. The court made the ruling recently after the Paris-based luxury goods manufacturer sued the woman, surnamed Lee, 41. The sum reflects the maximum fine for violating intellectual property rights — 500 times the value of the goods sold. Lee, a former sales clerk for Hermes Taiwan, bought four fake Hermes’ Birkin handbags and sold them through two second-hand shops in Taiwan, splitting the profits with the shop owners, media reports said.
■ TOURISM
Taichung travel fair opens
The 2009 Taichung International Travel Fair opened at the Taichung World Trade Center yesterday with a wide variety of discount travel packages on offer. This year’s fair is the largest ever, with 300 exhibitors and an additional 50 booths outside. Local and foreign tourism bureaus, airline companies, travel agencies, hotels, holiday resorts, theme parks, cruise liners and city and county governments are all exhibiting. Vistors found plenty of deals to choose from. Among them: a three-day trip to Hong Kong for NT$5,988 and a six-day excursion to Australia’s Gold Coast for NT$19,800. The fair runs through Monday.
■ AGRICULTURE
Orange demand plummets
Farmers in Taitung County are concerned about plummeting demand for their oranges, the local farmers’ association said yesterday. Association officials said orders for tangerines and Valencia oranges have fallen by some 70 percent. Taitung farmers had a bumper crop of Valencia oranges this spring but half the fruit remains unharvested and prices have fallen to NT$100 for 3.5kg, said Donghe farmers’ association officials.
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it
Taiwan's Gold Apollo Co (金阿波羅通信) said today that the pagers used in detonations in Lebanon the day before were not made by it, but by a company called BAC which has a license to use its brand. At least nine people were killed and nearly 3,000 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members detonated simultaneously across Lebanon yesterday. Images of destroyed pagers analyzed by Reuters showed a format and stickers on the back that were consistent with pagers made by Gold Apollo. A senior Lebanese security source told Reuters that Hezbollah had ordered 5,000 pagers from Taiwan-based Gold Apollo. "The product was not
COLD FACTS: ‘Snow skin’ mooncakes, made with a glutinous rice skin and kept at a low temperature, have relatively few calories compared with other mooncakes Traditional mooncakes are a typical treat for many Taiwanese in the lead-up to the Mid-Autumn Festival, but a Taipei-based dietitian has urged people not to eat more than one per day and not to have them every day due to their high fat and calorie content. As mooncakes contain a lot of oil and sugar, they can have negative health effects on older people and those with diabetes, said Lai Yu-han (賴俞含), a dietitian at Taipei Hospital of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. “The maximum you can have is one mooncake a day, and do not eat them every day,” Lai