Taiwan’s reality is dawning in US
Taiwan’s reality is dawning in USBy Stanley Kao 高碩泰The US House of Representatives’ Committee on Foreign Affairs on July 15 introduced the Ensuring American Global Leadership and Engagement (EAGLE) Act. With the relationship between Taiwan and the US riding high, this presents a golden opportunity for advocates in Washington and Taipei to seize the initiative and rename Taiwan’s representative office. Washington breaking off formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan in 1979 marked Taiwan’s lowest point on the international stage. One of the requirements stemming from the review was that Taiwan’s representative office in Washington change its name to the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office, which is still in use to this day. For the past quarter of a century, the argument has been made that “the time is not right” or that it would be “politically incorrect” to rename Taiwan’s representative office in Washington.
Source:Taipei Times
August 02, 2021 16:05 UTC
First local vaccine batches ready: FDA
Syringes of Medigen Vaccine Biologics Corp’s MVC COVID-19 vaccine are pictured in an undated photograph. Photo courtesy of the Food and Drug AdministrationThe Medigen vaccine, the first protein-based COVID-19 vaccine to be made available in Taiwan, would be good for six months before they expire, he added. Medigen secured an emergency use authorization (EUA) for the vaccine from the FDA on July 19. Eligible recipients of the Moderna vaccine in the next round would mainly be people in the ninth priority group of people who have a high-risk disease, a rare disease or catastrophic illness, he added. There are about 880,000 people in the ninth priority group who only selected the Moderna vaccine, Chen said.
Source:Taipei Times
August 02, 2021 16:00 UTC
Art of healing
COVID-19: What caused COVID-19 outbreak? Data show that it was unusually deadly, as well. While Taiwan has seen fewer than 800 COVID-19 deaths in total, 500 of them occurred last month alone, amid its biggest virus wave to date. The pathogen got through the stringent border curbs that had kept local infections at bay for most of last year, seeding an outbreak that tore through the then-largely unvaccinated elderly population. This pushed the case-fatality ratio to as high as that seen in Italy and the UKBy Cindy Wang and Iain Marlow
Source:Taipei Times
August 02, 2021 16:00 UTC
Taiya unveils two offshore wind farm projects
Taiya unveils two offshore wind farm projectsBy Angelica Oung / Staff reporterTaiya Renewable Energy Co (台亞風能) has thrown its hat into the ring for the third phase of Taiwan’s offshore wind farm development with two projects totaling 2.1 gigawatts (GW) in capacity, the company said yesterday as it applied for an environmental impact assessment (EIA). The Formosa 1 wind farm is pictured off Miaoli County on Oct. 15, 2019. It would be the first floating offshore wind farm proposal in Taiwan, it said. The company’s team comprises talent from other companies that participated in Taiwan’s previous phases of offshore wind farm development, including CSBC-DEME Wind Engineering Co (CDWE, 台船環海), Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy SA, Swancor Renewable Energy Co (上緯新能源) and Germany’s Wpd AG. The second phase of the nation’s offshore wind farm development was dominated by European players.
Source:Taipei Times
August 02, 2021 15:56 UTC
Ex-New Taipei City mayor Eric Chu to run for KMT chair
Ex-New Taipei City mayor Eric Chu to run for KMT chairStaff writer, with CNAFormer New Taipei City mayor Eric Chu (朱立倫) yesterday announced his bid for Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairperson, a position he held from 2015 to 2016. Former New Taipei City mayor Eric Chu visits a station distributing food for disadvantaged and low-income families on Wednesday last week in Taipei. Chu is expected to pose the greatest challenge to KMT Chairman Johnny Chiang’s (江啟臣) re-election bid. The KMT chairperson election was originally scheduled for July 24, but was postponed to Sept. 25 due to a local COVID-19 outbreak. Local media reports said former Kaohsiung mayor Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) and Sean Lien (連勝文), son of former vice president Lien Chan (連戰), are also interested in running for KMT chairperson.
Source:Taipei Times
August 02, 2021 15:56 UTC
Dine-in to resume in Taipei, New Taipei City, Yilan
Dine-in to resume in Taipei, New Taipei City, YilanBy Lin Shin-han and Cheng Ming-hsiang / Staff reportersRestaurants, night market food vendors and food courts in Taipei, New Taipei City and Yilan County can accept dine-in customers from today, provided that they strictly adhere to disease prevention regulations. Taipei and New Taipei City cooperated on the decision to lift the dine-in ban as residents frequently travel between the two cities, New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) said yesterday. An employee disinfects seating at a food court in New Taipei City yesterday. Photo: Peter Lo, Taipei TimesThe Yilan County Government later yesterday also announced it would lift the ban from today. Should dine-in customers wish to share their meals, service personnel should divide each dish into small portions before serving it to customers, they said.
Source:Taipei Times
August 02, 2021 15:56 UTC
Housing transactions fall in special municipalities
Housing transactions fall in special municipalitiesBy Crystal Hsu / Staff reporterHousing transactions last month totaled 17,591 units in the six special municipalities, down 29.7 percent from one month earlier, as the market started to feel the chilling effect of a local COVID-19 outbreak. Taichung reported the steepest month-on-month decline of 44.1 percent to 2,657 deals, followed by Taipei’s 34.7 percent fall to 1,937 transactions, local government figures showed. Transactions in Taoyuan and Kaohsiung both shrank 29 percent to 3,011 and 2,981 deals respectively. The number of transactions in Tainan slid 22 percent to 2,545 units, while New Taipei City posted a 20.5 percent decline to 4,460 deals, data showed. In the first seven months of this year, total transactions in the six cities totaled 152,000 units, up 15.6 percent from a year earlier, data showed.
Source:Taipei Times
August 02, 2021 15:56 UTC
Rights commission not fulfilling its duty: NPP
Rights commission not fulfilling its duty: NPPBy Shelley Shan / Staff reporterAlthough the National Human Rights Commission has been in existence for one year, it has not used even half of its budget, and laws governing the enforcement of its authority are not completely in place, the New Power Party (NPP) said yesterday. Article 2 of the Organic Act of the National Human Rights Commission (監察院國家人權委員會組織法) lists the functions and powers of the commission, including “investigating incidents involving torture, human rights violations or various forms of discrimination in accordance with its authority or in response to petition from the general public, and provide a remedy according to the law.”The main entrance to the Control Yuan’s National Human Rights Commission in Taipei is pictured on Aug. 1 last year. Control Yuan President Chen Chu (陳菊) has said that the commission’s two core tasks are to safeguard human rights in Taiwan and promote human rights education, but so far it had mainly focused on education, she said. “While we do not belittle the importance of reinforcing human rights education in the country, we want to remind the commission that it should perform all the tasks it is authorized to do,” Wang said. The NPP has proposed establishing a human rights committee at the Legislative Yuan to ensure that the National Human Rights Commission is consulted during the legislative process, he added.
Source:Taipei Times
August 02, 2021 15:56 UTC
Counterterrorism center underutilized: audit office
Counterterrorism center underutilized: audit officeSPECIAL SERVICE: The National Police Agency should hold more counterterrorism drills to make better use of the costly facility, the National Audit Office saidBy Hsieh Chun-lin and Kayleigh Madjar / Staff reporter, with staff writerIn the nearly four years since its creation, the National Police Agency’s (NPA) Counterterrorism Center has only been used for 38 days for counterterrorism training exercises, the National Audit Office said in a budget report on Thursday last week, calling on the agency to increase usage of the costly facility. The National Police Agency’s Counterterrorism Center in Taoyuan’s Sinwu District prepares for its opening ceremony on March 21, 2017. During this period the center was only used 38 days for counterterrorism drills, or 3.96 percent of the time, the report said. The center has mostly been used for general police training rather than specialized counterterrorism response, it said. The NPA said it would continue conducting counterterrorism trainings at the center, including joint drills with security and police forces.
Source:Taipei Times
August 02, 2021 15:56 UTC
COA tests ‘no shots’ plan for classical swine fever
COA tests ‘no shots’ plan for classical swine feverBy Yang Yuan-ting / Staff reporterTaiwan’s pork products could be sold to more countries if vaccinations against classical swine fever were no longer needed, Council of Agriculture (COA) Deputy Minister Huang Chin-cheng (黃金城) said on Saturday. However, countries such as Japan still ban imports of pork products from areas with classical swine fever, including Taiwan. The first 3,000 “sentinel” pigs from 150 farms would soon be slaughtered, and no classical swine fever has so far been detected among them, Huang said. It is very difficult to eliminate classical swine fever, especially when it can spread to wild boars, he added. Once the nation is free of classical swine fever, its pork products could be sold worldwide, he said, expressing optimism over the prospect.
Source:Taipei Times
August 02, 2021 15:56 UTC
Notes from central Taiwan: Southern Taiwan AmCham keeps it local
These traits were brought into sharper focus thanks to a dinner chat with the kind people of the American Chamber of Commerce of Southern Taiwan. Photo courtesy of the Kaohsiung City GovernmentFUTURE PLANSBrian Aiello, President of Southern Taiwan AmCham, spoke to me at length about AmCham’s programs and plans, as well as the problems Kaohsiung faces. This is sometimes inhibiting.”Businesses in southern Taiwan often create products and then focus narrowly on one market, when there might be a number of other applications for them. Another issue Southern Taiwan AmCham is working on is supply chain security. Southern Taiwan AmCham covers the counties of Penghu, Yunlin, Chiayi, Pingtung and Taitung, and the municipalities of Tainan and Kaohsiung.
Source:Taipei Times
August 01, 2021 15:56 UTC
Taipei exhibition features Aboriginal culture, artists
Taipei exhibition features Aboriginal culture, artistsBy Sherry Hsiao / Staff reporterA special exhibition aimed at highlighting the diversity of Aboriginal cultures yesterday opened at the Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall in Taipei to mark Indigenous Peoples’ Day. ), is curated by Masao Aki and organized by the Ministry of Culture, it said. A statue, titled Wings of the Aborigines, is pictured in the “Ita/kita” exhibition at the Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall in Taipei yesterday. Photo: Chuang Shih-hsien, Taipei TimesAruwai Kaumakan, Alik Studio, Siki Sufin, Eval Malinjinnan, Tafong Kati and Ruby Swana are among the participating artists, the ministry said. Everyone should cherish and recognize Aboriginal culture as an indispensable part of what defines Taiwan, Minister of Culture Lee Yung-te (李永得) said at the exhibition’s opening reception on Saturday.
Source:Taipei Times
August 01, 2021 15:56 UTC
Heavy rain triggers floods, landslides
Heavy rain triggers floods, landslidesSOAKED: Although rain in central and southern Taiwan is to ease today, chances of heavy or extremely heavy rain would be high in the morning, a CWB forecaster saidBy Shelley Shan / Staff reporterExtreme torrential rain brought by a southwesterly jet stream yesterday wreaked havoc in central and southern Taiwan, causing flash floods and triggering mudflows and landslides in mountainous areas. Although the rains in central and southern Taiwan would gradually ease, as the southwest jet stream turned south last night, chances of heavy or extremely heavy rain remain high this morning, Liu said. Southwesterly winds would remain strong and continue to affect the nation this week, he said, adding that people should beware of disasters caused by heavy or extremely heavy rain. Heavy to extremely heavy rainfall has been forecast in mountainous areas today and tomorrow. The warm and humid air rises after encountering the Central Mountain Range and dumps rain in central and southern Taiwan.
Source:Taipei Times
August 01, 2021 15:56 UTC
COVID-19: Donate domestic vaccines to counter Beijing: committee
It also suggested that the government respond prudently to Chinese attempts to harm the nation’s diplomatic relations through the distribution of vaccines. Once Taiwan’s vaccine needs are met, it should consider donating domestically produced vaccines to friendly nations in a demonstration of Taiwan’s “spirit of humane diplomacy,” it said. It must additionally offer needed support to overseas officials who are continuing the nation’s diplomatic work, even while facing the threat of the pandemic, the committee added. The report came shortly after the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Tuesday last week confirmed plans to donate doses of Medigen Vaccine Biologics’ COVID-19 vaccine to help allies that have struggled to procure vaccines. The ministry at the time cited Chinese “diplomatic extortion” and said it would only consider making donations once domestic demand has been met.
Source:Taipei Times
August 01, 2021 15:56 UTC
Tainan fab unaffected by gas mishap, rains: TSMC
While some TSMC production lines in Tainan’s Southern Taiwan Science Park received gas supplies that were found to be substandard, the chipmaker continued production using gas from other sources, the company said. The logo of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) is pictured at its facility at the Southern Taiwan Science Park in Tainan on Thursday last week. Stringent follow-up measures have been implemented to monitor and trace the contamination, TSMC said, adding that this would not significantly affect operations at the site. Moreover, torrential rains that yesterday caused flooding in Shanhua District (善化) did not affect operation at the nearby Fab 18 or at other facilities at the Southern Taiwan Science Park, the park operator said. TSMC is developing 2- and 3-nanometer processes, with the latter to start production in the second half of next year.
Source:Taipei Times
August 01, 2021 15:56 UTC