■SOCIETY
Man threatens to sue casino
A Taiwanese man who lost US$2 million in Las Vegas is threatening to sue the casino for using feng shui to cause his losing streak, media reported yesterday. The man, surnamed Yuan (袁), alleged that the Venetian dug a 1m² square hole in the wall of the presidential suite he was staying at in April last year and covered it with a black cloth, media reports said, adding that the casino also put two white towels in front of Yuan’s suite and turned on two large fans facing his room. Yuan claimed that his luck turned bad after discovering the arrangements and that he went from winning US$400,000 to losing US$2 million. “We Chinese drape black and white cloths only when there is a death in the family. It is such a taboo for regular people, let alone for gamblers,” Yuan was quoted as saying in the Chinese-language Apply Daily. Yuan filed a complaint against the Venetian after returning to Taiwan and demanded the cancellation of the US$2 million debt to the casino, half of it on credit, the paper said. The casino has promised to refund him US$100,000 in cash and the same amount in chips, the paper said, without explaining why it had agreed to this.
■SOCIETY
Visa applications welcomed
Application for working holidays in Japan will be accepted starting today, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday. All Republic of China citizens aged between 18 and 30 are welcome to apply for the one-year visa. No knowledge of Japanese is required. This is the first time that Taiwan and Japan have implemented a working holiday deal. A total of 2,000 openings are available and the figure could increase if feedback is positive, the ministry said. For more information visit: www.koryu.or.jp/taipei-tw/ez3_contents.nsf/Top.
■ENVIRONMENT
EPA to host seminar
To strengthen international cooperation on global atmospheric monitoring, the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) will host a seminar in Taipei on Tuesday with representatives from the US, Japan, South Korea and other countries. During the Second International Symposium on Atmospheric Observations and Advanced Measuring Techniques in Remote Areas, the EPA will share data collected at the Lulin Atmospheric Background Station (LABS) on Jade Mountain over the past three years. LABS, a background station built as per the UN’s Global Atmosphere Watch specifications, was constructed to monitor air pollutants carried by air currents in Asia. Since air pollutants are not limited to staying where they were generated, the purpose of such monitoring is to forecast pollutant-caused disasters such as acid rain, sand storms and smog.
■SOCIETY
Government eyes casino bill
The government will propose a draft bill to regulate casinos by the end of this year if a referendum on the construction of casino resorts is approved by residents in Penghu County, Minister Without Portfolio Tsai Tsun-hsiung (蔡勳雄) said yesterday. The Offshore Islands Development Act (離島建設條例), amended by the legislature early this year, allows construction of casinos on the islands if more than 50 percent of the locals agree to it in a referendum. The Penghu County Government has submitted an application with the Referendum Review Commission of the Executive Yuan to initiate a referendum on the issue, although it has yet to collect a sufficient number of signatures to put it to a popular vote.
A total lunar eclipse coinciding with the Lantern Festival on March 3 would be Taiwan’s most notable celestial event this year, the Taipei Astronomical Museum said, urging skywatchers not to miss it. There would be four eclipses worldwide this year — two solar eclipses and two lunar eclipses — the museum’s Web site says. Taiwan would be able to observe one of the lunar eclipses in its entirety on March 3. The eclipse would be visible as the moon rises at 5:50pm, already partly shaded by the Earth’s shadow, the museum said. It would peak at about 7:30pm, when the moon would
Taiwan’s Li Yu-hsiang performs in the men’s singles figure skating short program at the Milano-Cortina Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, on Tuesday. Li finished 24th with a score of 72.41 to advance to Saturday’s free skate portion of the event. He is the first Taiwanese to qualify for the free skate of men’s singles figure skating at the Olympics since David Liu in 1992.
The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) yesterday held a ceremony marking the delivery of its 11th Anping-class offshore patrol vessel Lanyu (蘭嶼艦), saying it would boost Taiwan’s ability to respond to Beijing’s “gray zone” tactics. Ocean Affairs Council Deputy Minister Chang Chung-Lung (張忠龍) presided over the CGA event in the Port of Kaoshiung. Representatives of the National Security Council also attended the event. Designed for long-range and protracted patrol operations at sea, the Lanyu is a 65.4m-long and 14.8m-wide ship with a top speed of 44 knots (81.5kph) and a cruising range of 2,000 nautical miles (3704km). The vessel is equipped with a
Two siblings in their 70s were injured yesterday when they opened a parcel and it exploded, police in Yilan said, adding the brother and sister were both in stable condition. The two siblings, surnamed Hung (洪), had received the parcel two days earlier but did not open it until yesterday, the first day of the Lunar New Year holiday in Taiwan, police said. Chen Chin-cheng (陳金城), head of the Yilan County Government Police Bureau, said the package bore no postmark or names and was labeled only with the siblings’ address. Citing the findings of a
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