■ Crime
Jail term for nude pictures
A 21-year-old Taipei man was sentenced yesterday to six months in jail for making public -- via the Internet -- nude pictures that he had taken of himself. The man, surnamed Hsiao, was convicted of obscene behavior. Hsiao, an employee at a high-tech company, had posted full-body pictures on a Web site, giving the general public easy access to the photos. According to the police, Hsiao posted the photos in an effort to attract homosexual admirers. He will be able to avoid jail time, however, by paying a NT$162,000 fine.
■ Missing foreigner
Chen asks public's help
President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) yesterday urged people to assist in the search for a US citizen who went missing in Taiwan in May last year. Chen made the call in the latest issue of the A-bian Electronic Paper, an Internet newsletter named after Chen's nickname "A-bian." Chen said that Barbara Klita sent him a second letter recently asking for his assistance in the search for her missing son, Fryderyk Mieszko Frontier. In addition to directing government agencies to step up their search efforts, Chen said he hopes ordinary citizens can also assist in the campaign. "Those who have leads about Frontier's whereabouts are welcome to contact relevant government authorities or inform Mrs Klita, " Chen said in the newsletter. Klita sent her first letter to Chen late last year. Chen published that letter along with Frontier's photo and Klita's e-mail address -- barbaraklita@collegeclub.com -- in the Dec. 18 issue of the newsletter.
■ Avian flu
Experts aid Vietnam
The government will send an expert to Vietnam to assist in its campaign against avian flu outbreaks, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs official said yesterday. Speaking at a regular news conference, Lin Sung-huan (林松煥), director of the East Asian and Pacific Affairs Department, said the Council of Agriculture has already sent a delegation of animal disease and quarantine experts to Vietnam to investigate its avian flu situation. In addition, Lin said, Tsai Hsiang-jung (蔡向榮), an associate professor in National Taiwan University's department of veterinary medicine, will leave for Vietnam next Monday to help with bird flu containment efforts. Meanwhile, Lin said, the Department of Health has donated medical supplies to Vietnam, including protective clothing, caps, surgical gloves and N95 surgical masks. The medical goods were delivered on Wednesday. Tsai will donate the goods to Vietnam on behalf of the government in a ceremony to be held in Hanoi next week, Lin said, adding that the Vietnamese government has expressed its gratitude for Taiwan's generous assistance.
■ Weather
Cold front arriving
Whether campaign activities on the last weekend ahead the presidential election will go smoothly depends on the weather. And the word from the Central Weather Bureau is that this weekend will be cold and rainy. A cold front will arrive today and bring rains to the north and the east over the weekend, the bureau said yesterday. Forecasters said temperatures will drop dramatically, with the highest temperature tomorrow being 19 degrees Celsius in the north. They said the weather in the center and south will remain pleasant. Low temperatures in the center over the weekend would be about 23 degrees Celsius and 26 degrees Celsius in the south.
DEEPER REVIEW: After receiving 19 hospital reports of suspected food poisoning, the Taipei Department of Health applied for an epidemiological investigation A buffet restaurant in Taipei’s Xinyi District (信義) is to be fined NT$3 million (US$91,233) after it remained opened despite an order to suspend operations following reports that 32 people had been treated for suspected food poisoning, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. The health department said it on Tuesday received reports from hospitals of people who had suspected food poisoning symptoms, including nausea, vomiting, stomach pain and diarrhea, after they ate at an INPARADISE (饗饗) branch in Breeze Xinyi on Sunday and Monday. As more than six people who ate at the restaurant sought medical treatment, the department ordered the
A strong continental cold air mass and abundant moisture bringing snow to mountains 3,000m and higher over the past few days are a reminder that more than 60 years ago Taiwan had an outdoor ski resort that gradually disappeared in part due to climate change. On Oct. 24, 2021, the National Development Council posted a series of photographs on Facebook recounting the days when Taiwan had a ski resort on Hehuanshan (合歡山) in Nantou County. More than 60 years ago, when developing a branch of the Central Cross-Island Highway, the government discovered that Hehuanshan, with an elevation of more than 3,100m,
Taiwan’s population last year shrank further and births continued to decline to a yearly low, the Ministry of the Interior announced today. The ministry published the 2024 population demographics statistics, highlighting record lows in births and bringing attention to Taiwan’s aging population. The nation’s population last year stood at 23,400,220, a decrease of 20,222 individuals compared to 2023. Last year, there were 134,856 births, representing a crude birth rate of 5.76 per 1,000 people, a slight decline from 2023’s 135,571 births and 5.81 crude birth rate. This decrease of 715 births resulted in a new record low per the ministry’s data. Since 2016, which saw
SECURITY: To protect the nation’s Internet cables, the navy should use buoys marking waters within 50m of them as a restricted zone, a former navy squadron commander said A Chinese cargo ship repeatedly intruded into Taiwan’s contiguous and sovereign waters for three months before allegedly damaging an undersea Internet cable off Kaohsiung, a Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) investigation revealed. Using publicly available information, the Liberty Times was able to reconstruct the Shunxing-39’s movements near Taiwan since Double Ten National Day last year. Taiwanese officials did not respond to the freighter’s intrusions until Friday last week, when the ship, registered in Cameroon and Tanzania, turned off its automatic identification system shortly before damage was inflicted to a key cable linking Taiwan to the rest of
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