SCIENCE
Students bag six golds
Taiwanese students took home six golds at the International Junior Science Olympiad in Bucharest, Romania, on Wednesday, winning the second-most medals out of 52 participating nations for those aged 15 and under. The event was held from Dec. 2 to Wednesday. Fan Yi-yang (范奕揚) was crowned the Olympiad’s “absolute winner” and won four other accolades on top of his gold medal, including the top spots for practical chemistry and biology tests, a theoretical test award and the highest overall score. The Taiwan delegation for this year’s Olympiad consisted of six students from Taipei, Taoyuan, Taichung, Tainan and Chiayi. The Ministry of Education said this year’s participants were guaranteed enrollment to the high school of their choice and a NT$200,000 scholarship.
CRIME
Stabber’s sentence upheld
The High Court on Thursday upheld an 11-year-and-four-month prison sentence for a man who fatally stabbed a Malaysian college student outside a Keelung karaoke club last year. A 23-year-old Malaysian student at National Taiwan Ocean University, surnamed Chen (陳), had gone out with friends to a karaoke club in Keelung on Nov. 14 last year. While waiting outside the club at 4am, Chen got involved in an argument with another man, Chen Chih-hung (陳志鴻), whose friends had barged into Chen’s KTV booth earlier that night. In the altercation that followed, Chen Chih-chung stabbed Chen’s right thigh with a switchblade and slashed the leg of Chen’s friend, surnamed Yen (顏). Chen, whose femoral artery was pierced in the stabbing, lost large amounts of blood, and died in hospital three days later of hypovolemic shock and multiple organ failure. The Keelung District Court found Chen Chih-chung guilty in August and sentenced him to 11 years in prison. Although the sentence was appealed by prosecutors and the defense, the High Court in its verdict on Thursday said that there was “nothing inappropriate” about the lower court’s ruling. The latest ruling can be appealed.
CRIME
Court upholds jail terms
The Supreme Court has upheld the jail terms of four fraudsters in Taichung who unlawfully detained and assaulted a man, which resulted in his death. Court documents said that the victim, surnamed Lin (林), handed over his bank account and password information to the Taichung-based fraud group on Dec. 6, 2022. The next day, Lin was unlawfully detained by the defendants, Liu (劉), Cheng (鄭), Jen (任) and Huang (黃). Huang, Cheng and a juvenile surnamed Yang (楊) covered Lin’s mouth, handcuffed him and shackled his feet, the documents said, adding that Liu and Jen beat Lin and stomped on his head. Lin later died from his injuries, and his body was dumped at a cemetery, the court said. In an earlier ruling on Feb. 1, the Taichung District Court said that when the gang discovered that Lin was not breathing and had no heartbeat, Yang administered first aid to Lin, indicating that they did not intend to kill him. Based on that, the four were sentenced to jail terms ranging from 10 years and six months to 16 years and six months. Prosecutors filed an appeal, saying that the gang had an “indirect intention” to kill Lin. The defendants also appealed the verdict, seeking lighter sentences. The High Court’s Taichung branch upheld the original decision by the lower court on Aug. 13. After further appeals by prosecutors and defendants, the Supreme Court also upheld the original verdict on Dec. 4. The decision is final.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened 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), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
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