The Ministry of the Interior might support fees for people who are rescued by air in mountainous areas after minor or preventable hiking accidents, the ministry told lawmakers on Thursday.
Minister of the Interior Hsu Kuo-yung (徐國勇) made the remark during a session of the legislature’s Internal Administration Committee in which lawmakers highlighted the rising number of medical evacuations conducted by the National Airborne Service Corps last year.
The corps last year conducted 453 rescue missions, a 39.7 percent rise from 2019, accounting for more than 17 hours of flight time, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Kuan Bi-ling (管碧玲) said, citing government records.
Photo copied by Liu Pin-chuan, Taipei Times
Most of them were due to hiking accidents, involving people who went to mountainous areas without a guide or sufficient preparation, she said.
The surge in domestic travel amid the COVID-19 pandemic might have contributed to the trend, Kuan said.
“While there should not be a general charge for the services, those who abuse them should pay for it,” she said.
DPP Legislator Lo Mei-ling (羅美玲) urged a user-pays principle, saying that this would help deter ill-prepared people from going into mountainous areas.
DPP Legislator Wang Mei-hui (王美惠) said that the government should draft a bill introducing fees for hikers who neglectfully necessiate rescue missions.
“People cannot knowingly go unprepared to the mountains and expect to be bailed out,” she said.
In response, Kuo said that the ministry supports proposals to charge people who need to be rescued after minor or preventable accidents due to insufficient preparation.
“They cannot call the corps to pick them up just because they feel dizzy,” he said.
Corps Captain Ching Yen-yuan (井延淵) said that the corps would discuss the issue with the National Fire Agency as well as other government departments involved in mountain search-and-rescue operations.
Rescuing a person by helicopter costs about NT$200,000, depending on the weather and terrain where an incident occurs, Ching said, adding that hikers usually do not cause rescue mission in easy terrain.
“Some search-and-rescue missions take two or three days. Sometimes specialists from other agencies have to be involved,” Ching said.
Taiwanese can file complaints with the Tourism Administration to report travel agencies if their activities caused termination of a person’s citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday, after a podcaster highlighted a case in which a person’s citizenship was canceled for receiving a single-use Chinese passport to enter Russia. The council is aware of incidents in which people who signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of Russia were told they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, Chiu told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Taipei. However, the travel agencies actually applied
New measures aimed at making Taiwan more attractive to foreign professionals came into effect this month, the National Development Council said yesterday. Among the changes, international students at Taiwanese universities would be able to work in Taiwan without a work permit in the two years after they graduate, explainer materials provided by the council said. In addition, foreign nationals who graduated from one of the world’s top 200 universities within the past five years can also apply for a two-year open work permit. Previously, those graduates would have needed to apply for a work permit using point-based criteria or have a Taiwanese company
The Shilin District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday indicted two Taiwanese and issued a wanted notice for Pete Liu (劉作虎), founder of Shenzhen-based smartphone manufacturer OnePlus Technology Co (萬普拉斯科技), for allegedly contravening the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例) by poaching 70 engineers in Taiwan. Liu allegedly traveled to Taiwan at the end of 2014 and met with a Taiwanese man surnamed Lin (林) to discuss establishing a mobile software research and development (R&D) team in Taiwan, prosecutors said. Without approval from the government, Lin, following Liu’s instructions, recruited more than 70 software
Taiwanese singer Jay Chou (周杰倫) plans to take to the courts of the Australian Open for the first time as a competitor in the high-stakes 1 Point Slam. The Australian Open yesterday afternoon announced the news on its official Instagram account, welcoming Chou — who celebrates his 47th birthday on Sunday — to the star-studded lineup of the tournament’s signature warm-up event. “From being the King of Mandarin Pop filling stadiums with his music to being Kato from The Green Hornet and now shifting focus to being a dedicated tennis player — welcome @jaychou to the 1 Point Slam and #AusOpen,” the
RSS