WEATHER
Cooler weather incoming
Low temperatures would be more prevalent throughout this week when the strongest cold front observed so far this fall arrives today, independent meteorologist Daniel Wu (吳德榮) said. The front today would bring rain to windward locations in northern, northeastern and eastern Taiwan, he said. Atmospheric moisture would be the highest tomorrow due to seasonal northeasterly winds, and is expected to bring sporadic and brief showers to northern, northeastern and eastern parts of the nation, he said. Central and southern Taiwan would be comfortably warm tomorrow, with cooler temperatures in the early morning and the evening. Atmospheric moisture would ease up by Wednesday or Thursday, bringing chances of lighter rain to the north coast off Keelung, the eastern parts of the Taipei area and the northeastern parts of Taiwan, which would make northern Taipei cool to cold, Wu said.
Photo provided by the Central Weather Administration
SOCIETY
Woman bitten by cobra
A 41-year-old woman was bitten by a cobra on the top of her right foot as she exited a public library in Taichung’s Longjing District (龍井) yesterday, police said. She was transported to a hospital, where she received anti-venom and remains under observation, the hospital said. Firefighters and contractors working with the Taichung Agriculture Bureau captured and removed the 30cm-long snake at the scene. Library director Chen Chiu-hua (陳秋華) said that staff fully inspected the building and confirmed that no other snakes were present. Police said the woman was bitten just as she activated the automatic door to exit the library. The snake might have emerged from a drainage channel near the library, police said.
DIPLOMACY
Legislators depart for US
Deputy Legislative Speaker Johnny Chiang (江啟臣), leading a 14-member cross-party delegation, yesterday departed from Taoyuan International Airport on a nine-day trip to the US and Paraguay, Taiwan’s only diplomatic ally in South America. They are to begin the trip in Detroit with a Taiwanese Chambers of Commerce of North America event to get a feel for the needs of overseas Taiwanese businesses, Chiang said, adding that the delegation would also meet with US representatives and senators to deepen bilateral ties. The group would then travel to Paraguay, an important ally of the Republic of China since 1957, he said. The trip follows visits to Taiwan over the past year by the presidents of the Paraguayan Chamber of Deputies and Senate.
SOCIETY
Fire sends 17 to hospital
A parked motorcycle in Changhua County burst into flames early yesterday morning, sending thick smoke throughout a nearby building and resulting in 17 nearby residents being taken to hospitals, the Changhua County Fire Bureau said. The bureau said it received a report at 3:45am of a parked motorcycle on fire under the sidewalk overhang of a five-story building. Fifteen firetrucks, 11 ambulances and 52 firefighters were dispatched to the scene, it said in a statement. After the fire was extinguished in about an hour, the firefighters sent 17 people suffering from smoke inhalation to local hospitals, Changhua City Mayor Lin Shih-hsien (林世賢) wrote on Facebook. The eldest of the people sent to a hospital was 73 years old, while the youngest was 11 months old, the fire bureau said. It said it was investigating the cause of the fire to determine who was responsible.
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
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