■POLITICS
No ‘push’ for raise
The Presidential Office denied yesterday that it had pushed for raises for the secretaries-general of the Presidential Office and the National Security Council (NSC). Presidential Office Spokesman Wang Yu-chi (王郁琦) said that Presidential Office Secretary-General Chan Chun-po (詹春柏) and NSC Secretary-General Su Chi (蘇起) would respect the legislature’s decision on whether to increase their salaries. The legislature is reviewing a bill on political appointees’ salaries. Minister of Civil Service Chang Che-chen (張哲琛) said the raises were necessary because the salaries for the two positions were equal with those of the heads of other government branches. The legislature resolved in 2004 to lower the pay of the Presidential Office NSC secretaries-general to the level of government ministers.
■POLITICS
Ma to sign UN covenants
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) is scheduled to sign two UN covenants tomorrow, the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy said yesterday. The foundation is planning to hold a news conference today to urge the Ma administration to use the international conventions in amending the controversial Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法). The amendments to the act have raised tensions between the ruling and opposition parties, with the opposition vowing to block the amendments on the legislative floor. Ma supports the proposal but has asked the Cabinet to reduce the fine for violators. At Ma’s behest, the legislature on March 31 ratified the UN’s International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights — 42 years after the nation signed them. The legislature also approved the Act Governing Execution of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (公民與政治權利國際公約及經濟社會文化權利國際公約施行法), making the two covenants legally binding. The Presidential Office has blamed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for the delay in signing the two covenants.
■PETROLEUM
CPC plans expansion
State-owned oil refiner CPC Corp is expected to further cooperation with the China-based Chinese National Offshore Oil Corp (CNOOC), which will expand the range of their oil exploration ventures to cover the northern continental areas of the South China Sea, Ministry of Economic Affairs officials said yesterday. The two sides reached a consensus on the issue in March during a visit to Beijing by CPC executives, and are likely to sign the contract by the end of this year, the officials said.
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
China’s newest Type-076 amphibious assault ship has two strengths and weaknesses, wrote a Taiwanese defense expert, adding that further observations of its capabilities are warranted. Jiang Hsin-biao (江炘杓), an assistant researcher at the National Defense and Security Research, made the comments in a report recently published by the institute about the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) military and political development. China christened its new assault ship Sichuan in a ceremony on Dec. 27 last year at Shanghai’s Hudong Shipyard, China’s Xinhua news agency reported. “The vessel, described as the world’s largest amphibious assault ship by the [US think tank] Center for Strategic and International
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