SOCIETY
MRT reports on thefts
The Taipei Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) system last year recorded 87 cases in which mislaid property was stolen, accounting for 30 percent of all crimes committed on the system, the Taipei City Police Department’s Rapid Transit Division said on Thursday. MRT police deal with numerous complaints of theft of mislaid items, including petty cash, umbrellas and raincoats, it said. However, as all MRT stations are monitored by security cameras, people who steal forgotten or misplaced items are almost guaranteed to get caught, they said. In January, a passenger reported that they forgot to take NT$300 (US$10.30) from an MRT card machine and that the money had been stolen when they returned to recover it, they said, adding that the suspect was tracked down and detained. Detained suspects frequently complain that they did not know picking up forgotten items of little value is a crime, police said. Under Article 337 of the Criminal Code, taking unlawful possession of mislaid or lost property is a crime punishable by a fine of up to NT$15,000 and offenders would end up with a criminal record, they said.
CRIME
Fugitive captured
A fugitive wanted over his alleged involvement in the kidnapping and murder of a man nearly 20 years ago has been arrested in Kaohsiung, the city’s Fengshan Police Precinct said on Friday. The man surnamed, Wu (巫), 54, was arrested by patrol officers on Wednesday night, the precinct said in a statement. Wu had been on a wanted list since prosecutors issued a warrant for his arrest on May 17, 2002, following the death of a man surnamed Lee (李), the precinct said. Lee was abducted in February 2002 by four kidnappers led by Tsai Feng-tsung (蔡峰宗), for a NT$15 million ransom, police said. Tsai was the victim’s neighbor in Tainan and plotted the kidnapping after learning that Lee had inherited a large sum of money from his family, police said. Tsai persuaded three of his friends to help with the abduction. Because the four failed to come to an agreement with Lee’s family over the ransom amount, they killed him, police said. Three of them were subsequently arrested and tried for murder in 2002, but authorities had been unable to track down Wu.
CULTURE
Taiwanese film wins in US
A feature-length film documenting the ballet scene in Taiwan has won the top jury award at an annual film and animation festival in California, where it competed against more than 200 works from 70 countries. The documentary, Ballet in Tandem (舞徑) by Taiwanese director Yang Wei-hsin (楊偉新), won Best International Feature Jury Award at this year’s American Documentary and Animation Film Festival (AmDocs), the Ministry of Culture said on Thursday. Ballet in Tandem explores the state of ballet in Taiwan and focuses on several Taiwanese dancers who dedicated themselves to the art, including Kuo Jung-an (郭蓉安), and the challenges they faced along the way. The director is planning to raise funds so the documentary that took him nine years to complete can be screened in Taiwanese theaters, the ministry said. The festival was held from April 7 to Monday, and featured documentaries and animations selected from about 2,000 entries, it said. Held annually in Palm Springs, AmDocs was created in 2011 to celebrate and promote documentary film, and independent filmmakers around the world who showcase knowledge and awareness through their stories about real people and issues.
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
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