CRIME
Three held over sex trade
Three Taiwanese were on Wednesday indicted for allegedly recruiting and sending women from Taiwan to the US and other countries to engage in prostitution. The suspects — two men surnamed Lin (林) and Chen (陳), and a woman surnamed Lin (林) — allegedly used social media to recruit women to work overseas as prostitutes, escorts or bar hostesses by promising them high earnings in a short time, the indictment issued by the Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office said. The three booked the womens’ flights, and arranged their visas and accommodations, it said. The trio arranged for about 50 women aged 25 to 35 to travel to the US, Canada and other countries to engage in prostitution from 2018 to early last year, investigators said. Prosecutors charged the suspects with breaches of sexual morality under the Criminal Code. The maximum sentence for the charge is five years in prison plus a NT$100,000 fine.
DIPLOMACY
Allies urged to back UN bid
The government would again ask its diplomatic allies to voice support for the inclusion of Taiwan in the UN, either by speaking up at the General Assembly or sending letters to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, Ministry of Foreign Affairs Secretary-General Lily Hsu (徐儷文) said yesterday. The UN General Assembly is to take place from Sept. 14 to 21. Taipei’s UN bid this year has three main appeals: demanding that the UN resolve the “inappropriate exclusion of Taiwan’s 23.5 million people from the UN system”; calling on the UN to change its “discriminatory policy” against Taiwanese passport holders and journalists from visiting UN headquarters to cover UN-related activities; and insisting that the UN takes steps to ensure that Taiwan has the right to participate in “an equal and dignified manner” in meetings, mechanisms and activities related to the implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals, Hsu added. As part of Taiwan’s appeal, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) has published an opinion piece titled “Reimagining a More Resilient UN System — with Taiwan in It” in international media, Hsu added. Taiwan’s representative office in New York City, where the UN’s headquarters is, would set up a Web page dedicated to promoting Taiwan’s inclusion in the UN before the assembly begins this year, she added.
DIPLOMACY
Belize lauded on anniversary
Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) yesterday congratulated Belize, one of the nation’s 15 diplomatic allies, on its 40th anniversary of independence and thanked the Caribbean ally for its consistent support of Taiwan in the international community over the years. In a video call with Belize Prime Minister John Briceno, Wu extended congratulations on behalf of President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) and the people of Taiwan on the 40th anniversary of Belize’s independence from the UK, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a news release. Taiwan looks forward to continuing to work with Belize, one of its important diplomatic allies in the Caribbean region, to strengthen the bilateral partnership for the mutual benefit and well-being of the two peoples, Wu said. In particular, Taiwan would maintain its efforts to help Belize combat COVID-19, revive its economy and boost its national development, he said. Wu also thanked Belize for consistently voicing its support for Taiwan’s participation in the international community, saying that he hoped Briceno would continue to do so in the years to come.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods