■ DIPLOMACY
Panama ties ‘solid’: MOFA
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) expressed confidence yesterday that bilateral ties with Panama would not be affected regardless of the result of the Central American ally’s presidential poll today. “We believe that whichever candidate wins the election, bilateral relations between Taiwan and Panama will remain unchanged,” ministry spokesman Henry Chen (陳銘政) said. Relations between Taiwan and Panama, however, are thought to have wavered in recent years as Panama tries to develop economic and trade relations with Beijing.
■ CRIME
Lo Fu-chu released on bail
Former independent legislator Lo Fu-chu (羅福助) was released on bail yesterday over his alleged involvement in a land digging and construction scandal. The Taipei District Court rejected Taipei prosecutors’ request that Lo remain in detention and released him on NT$1 million (US$30,000) bail yesterday morning. Lo has been barred him from leaving the country. Prosecutors said they found the decision unacceptable and said they would appeal to the Taiwan High Court. Lo is alleged to have ordered workers to dig up land in a mountainous area in Xindian (新店), Taipei County, for a period of five or six years and flattening hills to create 15 baseball fields. Lo is suspected of illegally selling the land and applying with the local government to build apartments, prosecutors said.
■ RELIEF WORK
Relief ‘platform’ launched
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Taiwan and Japan will be in charge of launching an international disaster relief and rescue platform to coordinate humanitarian aid efforts by non-governmental organizations (NGO) in Southeast Asia. Under the leadership of Taiwan and Japan, a memorandum was signed by nine NGOs from Taiwan, six from Japan and one each from the US and Indonesia at the 5th Southeast Asian NGO Forum held in Japan late last month. The agreement provides a platform for the signatory NGOs to launch a mechanism in four years to coordinate humanitarian aid in the event of any natural disaster in the region, said David Wu (吳建國), deputy head of the ministry’s NGO Affairs Committee. As for other NGO-related programs, Wu said his committee would work with the Taiwan Nurses Association to dispatch nursing personnel to Afghanistan on June 1 to run a three-month training program for Afghan nurses.
■ ENERGY
Bureau calls for timers
The Bureau of Energy is calling on local households to install timers on their hot water dispensers to regulate the amount of time they are turned on as a way to save electricity. By using a timer on water-heating devices, local households could still have access to hot drinking water at any time while saving the country nearly 1.6 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) per year, or about 0.8 percent of the country’s total electricity consumption, bureau officials said. The estimate was based on the results of a survey conducted by the nonprofit Industrial Technology Research Institute, which found that 85.2 percent of Taiwanese households keep their hot water dispensers running 24 hours a day and 81 percent keep their electrical thermal bottles running around the clock. It estimated that if timers were used across the country, some 1.3 billion kWh would be saved on the operation of hot water dispensers and nearly 290 million kWh would be saved on the use of hot water bottles.
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
The first bluefin tuna of the season, brought to shore in Pingtung County and weighing 190kg, was yesterday auctioned for NT$10,600 (US$333.5) per kilogram, setting a record high for the local market. The auction was held at the fish market in Donggang Fishing Harbor, where the Siaoliouciou Island-registered fishing vessel Fu Yu Ching No. 2 delivered the “Pingtung First Tuna” it had caught for bidding. Bidding was intense, and the tuna was ultimately jointly purchased by a local restaurant and a local company for NT$10,600 per kilogram — NT$300 ,more than last year — for a total of NT$2.014 million. The 67-year-old skipper
BREACH OF CONTRACT: The bus operators would seek compensation and have demanded that the manufacturer replace the chips with ones that meet regulations Two bus operators found to be using buses with China-made chips are to demand that the original manufacturers replace the systems and provide compensation for breach of contract, the Veterans Affairs Council said yesterday. Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Michelle Lin (林楚茵) yesterday said that Da Nan Bus Co and Shin-Shin Bus Co Ltd have fielded a total of 82 buses that are using Chinese chips. The bus models were made by Tron-E, while the systems provider was CYE Electronics, Lin said. Lin alleged that the buses were using chips manufactured by Huawei subsidiary HiSilicon Co, which presents a national security risk if the
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