Animal Rescue Team Taiwan yesterday criticized an animal shelter run by the New Taipei City Government’s Animal Protection and Health Inspection Office for allegedly abandoning an old, nearly blind dog on a mountain.
The group said it received a complaint yesterday from a dog owner surnamed Chen (陳) whose Maltese, Tang Tang (唐唐), went missing on Thursday near the Bali Ferry Pier in Bali District (八里).
After searching for some time, Chen learned that Tang Tang had been taken to the Bali District Fire Department, and was then sent to the public animal shelter, the group said.
Photo courtesy of Animal Rescue Team Taiwan
However, within 24 hours of Tang Tang’s arrival at the shelter, shelter staff had reportedly left it on a mountain, the group said, adding that the shelter also reportedly told Chen that it had not received Tang Tang.
Only after a police investigation did Chen discover that Tang Tang had been abandoned.
With the help of a local group on Facebook, Chen was able to find Tang Tang.
Old dogs are unable to survive in the wild, and Tang Tang is nearly blind, with poor senses of smell and hearing, Animal Rescue Team Taiwan spokesperson Anthony Ni (倪京台) said.
The shelter staff should be punished and Animal Protection and Health Inspection Office Director Chen Yuan-chuan (陳淵泉) should step down, Ni said.
Chen told the media yesterday that the case was under investigation, but he would request disciplinary action against himself.
A veterinarian stationed at the shelter has been transferred, two staff members have been fired and another staff member has also resigned, he said.
Hopefully the public would not ignore the office’s efforts to fight for animal rights due to a single case, Chen said.
Additional reporting by Chen Hsin-yu
China has reserved offshore airspace in the Yellow Sea and East China Sea from March 27 to May 6, issuing alerts usually used to warn of military exercises, although no such exercises have been announced, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported yesterday. Reserving such a large area for 40 days without explanation is an “unusual step,” as military exercises normally only last a few days, the paper said. These alerts, known as Notice to Air Missions (Notams), “are intended to inform pilots and aviation authorities of temporary airspace hazards or restrictions,” the article said. The airspace reserved in the alert is
NAMING SPAT: The foreign ministry called on Denmark to propose an acceptable solution to the erroneous nationality used for Taiwanese on residence permits Taiwan has revoked some privileges for Danish diplomatic staff over a Danish permit that lists “Taiwan” as “China,” Eric Huang (黃鈞耀), head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Department of European Affairs, told a news conference in Taipei yesterday. Reporters asked Huang whether the Danish government had responded to the ministry’s request that it correct the nationality on Danish residence permits of Taiwanese, which has been listed as “China” since 2024. Taiwan’s representative office in Denmark continues to communicate with the Danish government, and the ministry has revoked some privileges previously granted to Danish representatives in Taiwan and would continue to review
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
RSS