HEALTH
Costco to aid hepatitis cases
Members-only warehouse retailer Costco Taiwan yesterday promised assistance to any member who becomes ill after eating a contaminated frozen berry blend sold under the retailer’s Kirkland Signature brand. Those who seek medical attention should provide receipts, and assistance would be determined on an individual basis, it said. The US retailer was responding to calls by some consumers that it should compensate customers who ate the tainted product. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said one batch of the Kirkland Signature Three Berry Blend tested positive for hepatitis A after inspecting five batches of the product from the retailer’s warehouse in Kaohsiung this month. About 17 tonnes from the batch had been sold in Taiwan. The FDA said those who have eaten the frozen food snack should monitor their health for 60 days.
CRIME
Boyfriend suspect in death
A 32-year-old South Korean man surnamed Kim has been named a suspect in the death of his 31-year-old partner, a woman surnamed Lee, at a hotel in Kaohsiung, the Kaohsiung District Prosecutors’ Office said yesterday. The man was released on NT$100,000 bail and barred from leaving Taiwan, prosecutors said. Kim on Monday called first responders, who found the woman in the hotel room with no signs of life. Kim said he discovered his partner lying unconscious on the floor following an apparent fall, prosecutors said. Lee was pronounced dead at a hospital following doctors’ unsuccessful resuscitation efforts. An autopsy on Thursday revealed bleeding in the skull and under the scalp, indicative of blunt-force trauma inflicted by impact with an object or a wall, prosecutors said.
CRIME
Gun attack boss returned
A man accused of arranging a morning submachine gun attack on a New Taipei City pawn shop on April 20 was escorted from Malaysia to Taiwan by Criminal Investigation Bureau agents on Friday. A man surnamed Lin (林) fled to Kuala Lumpur on the day of the attack, but was detained upon arrival after Taiwanese police alerted their Malaysian counterparts, National Police Agency Director-General Huang Ming-chao (黃明昭) told a news conference. Lin and an alleged accomplice surnamed Tu (杜) were brought back to Taiwan on a China Airlines flight on Friday morning, the agency said. Lin is accused of ordering the attack in which a 17-year-old taxi passenger stopped mid-ride to fire more than 50 bullets at a pawn shop in Tucheng District (土城) before taking the same cab to a nearby police station and confessing.
CRIME
Managers suspects in fire
Prosecutors have named two employees of Lian-Hwa Foods Corp as suspects in a deadly fire that engulfed the company’s factory in Changhua County on Tuesday last week, leaving eight people dead and 14 injured. A suspect surnamed Tsai (蔡) was head of the factory’s fire management department, while another surnamed Cheng (鄭) was a site supervisor, the Changhua District Prosecutors’ Office said yesterday. Investigations and questioning of Tsai and Cheng led prosecutors to conclude that the men could be guilty of negligent homicide, the prosecutors’ office said. The two were released on bail of NT$300,000 each after prosecutors decided it was unnecessary to seek a court order for them to be held in custody. The eight people who died were four Filipino migrant workers and four Taiwanese.
Taipei and New Taipei City government officials are aiming to have the first phase of the Wanhua-Jungho-Shulin Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) line completed and opened by 2027, following the arrival of the first train set yesterday. The 22km-long Light Green Line would connect four densely populated districts in Taipei and New Taipei City: Wanhua (萬華), Jhonghe (中和), Tucheng (土城) and Shulin (樹林). The first phase of the project would connect Wanhua and Jhonghe districts, with Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall and Chukuang (莒光) being the terminal stations. The two municipalities jointly hosted a ceremony for the first train to be used
MILITARY AID: Taiwan has received a first batch of US long-range tactical missiles ahead of schedule, with a second shipment expected to be delivered by 2026 The US’ early delivery of long-range tactical ballistic missiles to Taiwan last month carries political and strategic significance, a military source said yesterday. According to the Ministry of National Defense’s budget report, the batch of military hardware from the US, including 11 sets of M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) and 64 MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile Systems, had been scheduled to be delivered to Taiwan between the end of this year and the beginning of next year. However, the first batch arrived last month, earlier than scheduled, with the second batch —18 sets of HIMARS, 20 MGM-140 missiles and 864 M30
Representative to the US Alexander Yui delivered a letter from the government to US president-elect Donald Trump during a meeting with a former Trump administration official, CNN reported yesterday. Yui on Thursday met with former US national security adviser Robert O’Brien over a private lunch in Salt Lake City, Utah, with US Representative Chris Stewart, the Web site of the US cable news channel reported, citing three sources familiar with the matter. “During that lunch the letter was passed along, and then shared with Trump, two of the sources said,” CNN said. O’Brien declined to comment on the lunch, as did the Taipei
A woman who allegedly attacked a high-school student with a utility knife, injuring his face, on a Taipei metro train late on Friday has been transferred to prosecutors, police said yesterday. The incident occurred near MRT Xinpu Station at about 10:17pm on a Bannan Line train headed toward Dingpu, New Taipei City police said. Before police arrived at the station to arrest the suspect, a woman surnamed Wang (王) who is in her early 40s, she had already been subdued by four male passengers, one of whom was an off-duty Taipei police officer, police said. The student, 17, who sustained a cut about
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