POLITICS
Taro Aso to visit Taiwan
Japan’s former prime minister Taro Aso is to visit Taiwan from Monday to Wednesday, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday in a news release. Aside from giving a keynote speech at the Ketagalan Forum on Tuesday, vice president of Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party is to meet with President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), Vice President William Lai (賴清德), Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮), former legislative speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) and Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安). He is also to pay his respects at the resting place of former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝).
SOCIETY
Illegal workers killed
Two Thai nationals killed in a car crash while working for a Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) subcontractor during Typhoon Khanun were illegally employed, officials said yesterday. The Taoyuan Department of Labor said that the two Thai nationals, who died along with two Taiwanese men when the car they were traveling in plunged 150m into a valley in Fusing District (復興) on Thursday, were undocumented migrant workers. The department added that two other Thai nationals injured in the accident were also working illegally and had entered Taiwan on tourist visas. The Taoyuan Labor Inspection Office is looking into how they were employed and would act according to law, officials said.
EDUCATION
Taiwanese students awarded
Taiwanese students won several medals at the 2023 Microsoft Office Specialist World Championship in Orlando, Florida. Chen Bing-hong (陳秉鴻) won US$8,000 in the Microsoft Word (Office 2016) category. Chen, a student at Yi Ming Senior High School in Hsinchu, was among more than 190 competitors from 40 countries battling out at the Certiport-organized annual championships, which took place from Sunday to Wednesday. Wu Cheng-yan (吳承諺) of National Taipei University of Business finished second in a later version of Microsoft Word (Microsoft 365 Apps and Office 2019), while Tsao Ching-chi (曹景棋), a student of New Taipei City-based Chihlee University of Technology, won a bronze medal in PowerPoint. Yuan Tung (遠彤) of Taipei City University of Science and Technology took 10th place in the Excel 2016 category.
SOCIETY
Family seeks compensation
The family of a 21-year-old student killed by an air-conditioning unit that fell 17 stories in New Taipei City has applied for state-funded restitution of NT$1.8 million (US$56,798), the Ministry of Justice said yesterday. A ministry official said that the Association for Victims Support had met with the family of the student, surnamed Huang (黃), on July 21 to help them apply for state-funded restitution under the Crime Victim Rights Protection Act (犯罪被害人權益保障法). According to the act, the surviving relatives of those who died as a result of being a victim of a crime are conditionally entitled to state-funded restitution of NT$1.8 million. The restitution would be paid to Huang’s family by the New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office once it is approved by a review committee of the association’s New Taipei City branch toward the end of this month, the ministry said. Huang, a student at National Chengchi University, died on July 20 when she was waiting for a bus on a sidewalk near MRT Xinpu station in the city’s Banciao District (板橋), where she was struck on the head by an air-conditioning unit weighing about 30kg.
WANG RELEASED: A police investigation showed that an organized crime group allegedly taught their clients how to pretend to be sick during medical exams Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) and 11 others were released on bail yesterday, after being questioned for allegedly dodging compulsory military service or forging documents to help others avoid serving. Wang, 33, was catapulted into stardom for his role in the coming-of-age film Our Times (我的少女時代). Lately, he has been focusing on developing his entertainment career in China. The New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office last month began investigating an organized crime group that is allegedly helping men dodge compulsory military service using falsified documents. Police in New Taipei City Yonghe Precinct at the end of last month arrested the main suspect,
A cat named Mikan (蜜柑) has brought in revenue of more than NT$10 million (US$305,390) for the Kaohsiung MRT last year. Mikan, born on April 4, 2020, was a stray cat before being adopted by personnel of Kaohsiung MRT’s Ciaotou Sugar Refinery Station. Mikan was named after a Japanese term for mandarin orange due to his color and because he looks like an orange when curled up. He was named “station master” of Ciaotou Sugar Refinery Station in September 2020, and has since become famous. With Kaohsiung MRT’s branding, along with the release of a set of cultural and creative products, station master Mikan
RISING TOURISM: A survey showed that tourist visits increased by 35 percent last year, while newly created attractions contributed almost half of the growth Changhua County’s Lukang Old Street (鹿港老街) and its surrounding historical area clinched first place among Taiwan’s most successful tourist attractions last year, while no location in eastern Taiwan achieved a spot in the top 20 list, the Tourism Administration said. The listing was created by the Tourism Administration’s Forward-looking Tourism Policy Research office. Last year, the Lukang Old Street and its surrounding area had 17.3 million visitors, more than the 16 million visitors for the Wenhua Road Night Market (文化路夜市) in Chiayi City and 14.5 million visitors at Tainan’s Anping (安平) historical area, it said. The Taipei 101 skyscraper and its environs —
Taiwan on Friday said a New Zealand hamburger restaurant has apologized for a racist remark to a Taiwanese customer after reports that it had first apologized to China sparked outrage in Taiwan. An image posted on Threads by a Taiwanese who ate at Fergburger in Queenstown showed that their receipt dated Sunday last week included the words “Ching Chang,” a racial slur. The Chinese Consulate-General in Christchurch in a statement on Thursday said it had received and accepted an apology from the restaurant over the incident. The comment triggered an online furor among Taiwanese who saw it as an insult to the
RSS