DIPLOMACY
Speaker’s diplomatic visit
Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) is to leave today on a visit to the US and Central America, during which he will deliver a speech in Anchorage, Alaska, and meet with the UN mission chiefs of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies in New York. On the Central American leg of the trip, Wang is to visit diplomatic allies Nicaragua and El Salvador. In the US, Wang is to give a speech at the opening of the annual meeting of the US National Speakers Conference in Anchorage. He is then to travel to New York, where he will host a dinner in honor of the UN ambassadors of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies. He is scheduled to depart New York on Aug. 22 for Nicaragua followed by El Salvador.
TRAVEL
Philippines mulls visa deal
The Philippines is to hopefully grant Taiwanese visa waiver status by the end of the year, according to Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Hsu Shao-ping (徐少萍). Hsu made the remarks following a recent trip to the Philippines, where she, at the head of a legislative delegation, met with six members of Philippine congress, including House Deputy Speaker Jesus Remulla and Senator Alan Cayetano. Members of the delegation included KMT legislators Su Ching-chuan (蘇清泉) and Liao Cheng-ching (廖正井). Taiwanese made around 190,000 visits to the Philippines last year and visa fees reached NT$300 million (US$9.98 million), Su said. If Manila decides to grant Taiwanese visa-free status, it could help increase the number of Taiwanese visitors to the country by at least 50 percent and help boost its economy, he added. According to Liao, the Philippine senators and represenatives they met on the trip all promised to encourage Manila’s Department of Foreign Affairs to grant Taiwan visa-free status as soon as possible.
TRANSPORT
Xinyi gets bus-route map
Taipei City’ Department of Transportation is providing bus-route maps at major bus stops in Xinyi District (信義) to help passengers find bus lines to their destinations in the area. The map integrates bus information around the district, including bus routes around the area, locations of major bus stops and bus lines that travel to other districts. Passengers can identify their locations and find the bus lines they need to reach their destinations. Department of Transportation Commissioner Jason Lin (林志盈) said the design of the map aims to help both residents and visitors who plan to travel around the city by bus. For example, if a foreign visitor plans to go to Taipei Main Station from Taipei 101, he or she can easily find the bus lines to the station on the map. The map is available at 28 bus stops in the distric, and portable maps are available at Taipei City Hall Transfer Station and major department stores. The department said it would expand the scope of its service and also provide bus route maps in other areas.
HEALTH
Officials impeached
The Control Yuan yesterday passed a resolution to impeach former Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine director Hsu Tien-lai (許天來) and Council of Agriculture Deputy Minister Wang Cheng-teng (王政騰) for seeking to cover up January’s H5N2 avian flu outbreak. The resolution said Wang inappropriately lobbied to cover up the outbreak of flu as a favor to a friend and that Hsu had also committed illegal lobbying to cover up the outbreak. Both face disciplinary hearings.
A crowd of over 200 people gathered outside the Taipei District Court as two sisters indicted for abusing a 1-year-old boy to death attended a preliminary hearing in the case yesterday afternoon. The crowd held up signs and chanted slogans calling for aggravated penalties in child abuse cases and asking for no bail and “capital punishment.” They also held white flowers in memory of the boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), who was allegedly tortured to death by the sisters in December 2023. The boy died four months after being placed in full-time foster care with the
A Taiwanese woman on Sunday was injured by a small piece of masonry that fell from the dome of St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican during a visit to the church. The tourist, identified as Hsu Yun-chen (許芸禎), was struck on the forehead while she and her tour group were near Michelangelo’s sculpture Pieta. Hsu was rushed to a hospital, the group’s guide to the church, Fu Jing, said yesterday. Hsu was found not to have serious injuries and was able to continue her tour as scheduled, Fu added. Mathew Lee (李世明), Taiwan’s recently retired ambassador to the Holy See, said he met
A BETRAYAL? It is none of the ministry’s business if those entertainers love China, but ‘you cannot agree to wipe out your own country,’ the MAC minister said Taiwanese entertainers in China would have their Taiwanese citizenship revoked if they are holding Chinese citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said. Several Taiwanese entertainers, including Patty Hou (侯佩岑) and Ouyang Nana (歐陽娜娜), earlier this month on their Weibo (微博) accounts shared a picture saying that Taiwan would be “returned” to China, with tags such as “Taiwan, Province of China” or “Adhere to the ‘one China’ principle.” The MAC would investigate whether those Taiwanese entertainers have Chinese IDs and added that it would revoke their Taiwanese citizenship if they did, Chiu told the Chinese-language Liberty Times (sister paper
The Shanlan Express (山嵐號), or “Mountain Mist Express,” is scheduled to launch on April 19 as part of the centennial celebration of the inauguration of the Taitung Line. The tourism express train was renovated from the Taiwan Railway Corp’s EMU500 commuter trains. It has four carriages and a seating capacity of 60 passengers. Lion Travel is arranging railway tours for the express service. Several news outlets were invited to experience the pilot tour on the new express train service, which is to operate between Hualien Railway Station and Chihshang (池上) Railway Station in Taitung County. It would also be the first tourism service
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