The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is to work with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) on projects that provide assistance to disadvantaged groups, especially children, in Africa, as well as India and other countries.
One of the projects, which involves digging wells, building water tanks and promoting water safety awareness in India, is expected to provide cleaner water and reduce the number of local residents who fall ill from drinking contaminated water, the ministry said in a news release last week.
The project is to be carried out with Good Neighbors Taiwan, which was established in July last year to support vulnerable children and high-risk families in developing countries, it said.
Another project, in cooperation with the Pu-Hsein Educational Foundation and Amitofo Care Center African Executive Association, is to help African orphans learn Chinese to enhance their competitiveness as adults, the ministry said.
The education program by the two Buddhist charity organizations, which began in 2013, has benefited more than 9,000 African children and youths, it said.
The program involves sending instructors to teach traditional Chinese characters and the Chinese language in seven schools that shelter orphans in Eswatini, Malawi, Lesotho, Namibia, Mozambique and Madagascar, it added.
The ministry said that it would also help the Noordhoff Craniofacial Foundation-Taiwan, which is dedicated to helping people with cleft lip and palate and craniofacial deformity, in its project with the Chang Gung Memorial Hospital system.
The project involves holding international conferences and training medical personnel from other nations, it said.
Other cooperation projects include a Taiwan-Vietnam education project with the Zhi-Shan Foundation Taiwan, which promotes academic exchanges, and a young women’s empowerment project with the Garden of Hope Foundation, which is focused on organizing training camps for young women and hosting the annual Asian Girl Awards that highlight the achievements of girls, the ministry said.
Department of NGO International Affairs Director-General Scott Lai (賴銘琪) on March 27 signed cooperation agreements with the NGOs at the ministry’s headquarters in Taipei, praising Taiwan’s NGO sector for its active international participation and vowing to continue supporting such groups to increase Taiwan’s international visibility.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching