CRIME
Pawnshop hit by bullets
A 17-year-old surnamed Liu (劉) yesterday turned himself in after shooting more than 50 bullets into a closed pawnshop in New Taipei City’s Tucheng District (土城), the Tucheng Police Precinct said. Liu took a taxi to the pawnshop on Sichuan Road and at 8:52am shot in the store’s direction, leaving 65 bullet holes in the store’s steel shutters and nearby scooters, police said. He took the same taxi to the Banciao Precinct’s Daguan Police Station and turned himself in at about 8:55am, police said. Police cordoned off the area, and found a gun and two magazines at the site, they said. No one was injured, they said, adding that they are looking into potential motives.
Photo copied by Hsu Sheng-lun, Taipei Times
SOCIETY
Fire kills three people
A fire in a third-floor apartment in New Taipei City’s Tamsui District (淡水) late on Wednesday killed three people and left one in critical condition, police said yesterday. Eight people, all from the same family, were pulled from the blaze by firefighters, who received a report of the incident on Danhai Road at 11:13pm. A 74-year-old woman, her four-year-old grandson and her 52-year-old son were pronounced dead at a hospital after out-of-hospital cardiac arrests, police said. The woman’s 58-year-old daughter, who also had a cardiac arrest, was resuscitated, but was in a critical condition, police said. Three other grandchildren, aged 19, 24 and 30, and the deceased man’s 42-year-old wife sustained minor injuries, police said. Authorities said they were investigating the cause of the fire.
CUSTOMS
Vitamins seized at border
A shipment of multivitamin tablets imported by warehouse club Costco was seized at the border after being found to contain residues of a banned preservative, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said on Tuesday. A total of 1,478.86kg of Webber Naturals’ nutritional tablets for men supplied by Factors Group of Nutritional Companies Inc was confiscated after sample testing on Tuesday detected 0.01g/kg of ethyl p-hydroxybenzoate, traces of which are not permitted in vitamins. The nation allows a limited permissible level of ethyl p-hydroxybenzoate in bean curd skin, dried tofu, soy sauce and non-
carbonated drinks, the FDA said, adding that it has increased random tests of vitamin products from Canada to 20 to 50 percent of shipments from 2 to 10 percent. Other items rejected and destroyed or returned by customs include 2,000kg of basmati rice from India, 27,600kg of fresh pumpkin from China and 780kg of marshmallows from the Philippines, it said.
EDUCATION
Universities to merge
National Taiwan University of Science and Technology (Taiwan Tech) and Hwa Hsia University of Technology have agreed to merge, the two institutes said on Tuesday last week. It would be the nation’s first merger between a public and private university, they said in a statement. The plan awaits approval by the Ministry of Education. Hwa Hsia would not enroll students for the 2023-2024 academic year and would close after the 2025-2026 academic year. Students whose graduation is delayed would be eligible to continue their studies under a special program arranged by the ministry, the statement said. To protect the rights and interest of faculty and staff, Hwa Hsia would provide severance and retirement packages upon termination of employment, while Taiwan Tech would hire some of them for project teacher and staff positions over the next four to five years based on employment contracts, it said.
INCREASED CAPACITY: The flights on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays would leave Singapore in the morning and Taipei in the afternoon Singapore Airlines is adding four supplementary flights to Taipei per week until May to meet increased tourist and business travel demand, the carrier said on Friday. The addition would raise the number of weekly flights it operates to Taipei to 18, Singapore Airlines Taiwan general manager Timothy Ouyang (歐陽漢源) said. The airline has recorded a steady rise in tourist and business travel to and from Taipei, and aims to provide more flexible travel arrangements for passengers, said Ouyang, who assumed the post in July last year. From now until Saturday next week, four additional flights would depart from Singapore on Monday, Wednesday, Friday
Taiwan’s three major international carriers are increasing booking fees, with EVA Airways having already increased the charge to US$28 per flight segment from US$25, while China Airlines (CAL) and Starlux Airlines are set to follow suit. Booking fees are charged by airlines through a global distribution system (GDS) and passed on to passengers. Carriers that apply the fees include CAL, EVA, Starlux and Tigerair Taiwan. A GDS is a computerized network operated by a company that connects airlines with travel agents and ticketing platforms, allowing reservations to be made and processed in real time. Major players include Amadeus, Sabre and Travelport. EVA Air began
The Ministry of National Defense yesterday reported the return of large-scale Chinese air force activities after their unexplained absence for more than two weeks, which had prompted speculation regarding Beijing’s motives. China usually sends fighter jets, drones and other military aircraft around the nation on a daily basis. Interruptions to such routine are generally caused by bad weather. The Ministry of National Defense said it had detected 26 Chinese military aircraft in the Taiwan Strait over the previous 24 hours. It last reported that many aircraft on Feb. 25, when it spotted 30 aircraft, saying Beijing was carrying out another “joint combat
WATCH FOR HITCHHIKERS: The CDC warned those returning home from Japan to be alert for any contagious diseases that might have come back with them People who have returned from Japan following the World Baseball Classic (WBC) games during the weekend are recommended to watch for symptoms of infectious gastroenteritis, flu and measles for two weeks, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said. Flu viruses remain the most common respiratory pathogen in Taiwan in the past four weeks and the influenza B virus accounted for 55.7 percent of the tested cases, exceeding the percentage of influenza A (H3N2) infections and becoming the local dominant strain, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said at a news conference on Tuesday. There were 82,187 hospital visits for
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