■ CULTURE
CMPC boss keeps mum
Foxlink and Sollink chairman Gou Tai-chiang (郭台強), who bought the Central Motion Picture Corp (CMPC) in 2006, yesterday refused to say whether the country’s oldest film company would continue making films. Gou skirted the question twice at the Government Information Office as it held a ceremony marking the handover of the CMPC’s films to the state-owned Chinese Taipei Film Archive for preservation. The CMPC retains ownership of the 947 films. Addressing the audience, mostly actors and actresses at the ceremony, Gou made no mention of whether the company would continue to make films.
■ DIPLOMACY
Ma takes businessmen along
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) will conduct a three-nation state visit to Central America later this month, and will for the first time take business leaders with him, the Presidential Office said yesterday. Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Javier Hou (侯清山) said the main purpose of the visit was to attend the inauguration of Panamanian president-elect Ricardo Martinelli next Wednesday. The 169-person delegation will depart on Monday and return on July 7, with transfer stops in San Francisco on the way out and in Honolulu on the way back. The trip will also take Ma to Nicaragua and Honduras. Accompanying Ma will be first lady Chow Mei-ching (周美青), the Ju Percussion Group and three business leaders, EVA Air chairman Steve Lin (林寶水), Shin Kong Medical Club vice president Hung Tzu-jen (洪子仁) and Bionet Corp chairman Chris Tsai (蔡政憲). The delegation will also include 20 government officials, nine Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators, 11 KMT local chiefs, members of charity groups, university presidents, students and academics.
■ LEGISLATURE
Provisional session mulled
The legislature is likely to hold a provisional session during the summer recess, Presidential Office Spokesman Wang Yu-chi (王郁琦) said yesterday. Wang told reporters after President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) regular meeting with political leaders at the Presidential Office yesterday that Ma hoped Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) and Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) would further discuss when to hold a provisional session and what bills would be tackled. However, Wang Jin-pyng told reporters at the legislature that Ma had not touched on the issue during the meeting.
■ CULTURE
Pingpu head criticizes CIP
Siraya Cultural Association chairwoman Uma Talavan yesterday accused the Council of Indigenous Peoples (CIP) of being insincere about restoring Aboriginal status to the nation’s Pingpu Aborigines after a fruitless meeting with council officials. The Pingpu are an amalgam of Aboriginal tribes who once inhabited most of the country’s lowland regions. Most Pingpu tribes lost official recognition as Aborigines in the 1950s after they failed to register their Aboriginal status with the government. Talavan visited the CIP yesterday, hoping to meet CIP Minister Chang Jen-hsiang (章仁香) or other high-ranking officials to discuss restoring their status. However, only lower-ranking officials with no decision-making power attended the meeting and told Talavan that the council had formed a special task force to look into the issue — the same response that the CIP has been giving to activists since the beginning of the year. Talavan and other activists staged a sit-in protest outside the council after the meeting and vowed to mobilize a larger crowd later this week.
The US House of Representatives yesterday passed the PROTECT Taiwan Act, which stipulates that Washington would exclude China from participating in major global financial organizations if its actions directly threaten Taiwan’s security. The bill, proposed by Republican US Representative Frank Lucas, passed with 395 votes in favor and two against. It stipulates that if China’s actions pose any threat to Taiwan’s security, economic or social systems, the US would, “to the maximum extent practicable,” exclude China from international financial institutions, including the G20, the Bank for International Settlements and the Financial Stability Board. The bill makes it clear that China
Garbage and recycling schedules are to vary from Saturday through Sunday next week over the Lunar New Year holiday period. The following collection information is from the governments of the six special municipalities. Taipei Regular service: Sunday to Monday next week. No service: Tuesday to Thursday next week. Extra service: Friday next week. Regular service resumes: Saturday next week. New Taipei City Extra service: Sunday. Adjusted collection time: Monday next week — garbage collection is to begin in the morning and end at 6pm. No service: Tuesday to Thursday next week. Regular service resumes: Friday next week. Note: Garbage can be dropped off at 70
A KFC branch in Kaohsiung may be fined between NT$60,000 and NT$200 million (US$1,907 and US$6.37 million), after a customer yesterday found an entire AAA battery inside an egg tart, the Kaohsiung Department of Health said today. The customer was about to microwave a box of egg tarts they had bought at the fast-food restaurant’s Nanzih (楠梓) branch when they checked the bottom and saw a dark shadow inside one of them, they said in a Threads post. The customer filmed themself taking the egg tart apart to reveal an entire AAA battery inside, which apparently showed signs of damage. Surveillance footage showed
GROUP EFFORT: The number of inbound travelers rose 11 to 12 percent last month, with a significant increase in tourists from Europe and North America, an official said The government aims to attract 9.4 million visitors this year, the Tourism Administration said yesterday, citing last year’s success in diversifying tourist markets. Taiwan last year drew about 8.57 million international arrivals, 72.3 percent of pre-COVID-19 levels. By contrast, the nation had about 18.94 million outbound tourists last year, surpassing the pre-COVID-19 level of 17.1 million. The estimated tourism revenue deficit was about NT$700.9 billion (US$22.22 billion). Taoyuan International Airport Corp expects more than 160,000 passengers to pass through the nation’s largest airport daily during the Lunar New Year holiday, which begins on Saturday. As of Jan. 30, the nation’s average hotel occupancy rate
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