CRIME
Man caught with cetaceans
Coast Guard Administration personnel yesterday seized 97kg of cetacean meat from a Yunlin County man surnamed Lin (林), 54. They said that they found two heads belonging to cetaceans, but could not determine the species. Lin reportedly loaded the meat onto his truck in Pingtung County’s Donggang Township (東港) and drove along Formosa Freeway (Freeway No. 3). Coast guard personnel stopped him at the rest area in Tainan’s Sinhua District (新化), where city officials collected samples of the meat from his truck and handed him over to police for breaching the Wildlife Conservation Act (野生動物保育法). Coast guard personnel said that Lin might have been planning to sell the meat at seafood stores in Yunlin County. In July last year, Lin was caught transporting cetacean meat in Yilan County. Whales and dolphins are protected under the act, and those caught killing them face six months to five years in prison, or a fine of NT$200,000 to NT$1 million (US$6,599 to NT$32,995).
CULTURE
Eslite auctioning collection
Eslite Bookstore’s Dunnan branch in Taipei is hosting an old book auction until April 15, as the three-decade-old outlet is to close on May 31. Established in 1989, the branch was the chain’s first store and made its name with books on arts and the humanities. The auction features a collection of art by Chinese painter Zhang Xiaogang (張曉剛), The Beatles: The BBC Archives 1962-1970 and US photographer Annie Leibovitz’s collection Annie Leibovitz: The Early Years,1970-1983, which includes the iconic photograph of John Lennon and Yoko Ono cuddling.
HEALTH
New Taipei extends closures
New Taipei City’s public spaces, sports centers and museums are to remain closed for another 14 days, after having been shut on March 20 due to the COVID-19 outbreak. Ahead of the long Tomb Sweeping Day weekend, which begins today, New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) yesterday said that containing the disease is the most important thing right now, especially when the number of people in home isolation or quarantine continues to rise. A total of 9,635 people in the city are in home quarantine, while the number of people using the city government’s online memorial services for ancestors has grown 40 percent from last year, city government data showed.
HEALTH
Doctor warns on screen use
A Taipei City Hospital doctor cautioned against the excessive use of digital devices, citing a case in which a woman, complaining of persistently seeing a shadow out of her left eye, was diagnosed with acute posterior vitreous detachment. Huang Che-hung (黃哲宏), an ophthalmologist at the hospital’s Heping branch, on Sunday said that the vitreous humor is a gel-like substance in the eye that can slowly liquify from age and use. The posterior vitreous, suffering from a lack of support, can then detach from the retina and shrink toward the center of the vitreous cavity. For the most part, posterior vitreous detachment would not affect a person’s vision, but it is irreversible, Huang said. If there are no complications, people should only see small dots like flies, he said. However, if a person experiences vitreomacular adhesion, or the strong adhesion of the vitreous to the retina, the condition could cause them to see lightning-like flashes, he said. If a person experiences any of these symptoms, they should consult a doctor, Huang said.
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
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