TECHNOLOGY
Taiwan wins big in Seoul
Taiwan on Friday won a grand prize, 22 golds, 25 silvers and 34 bronze awards, as well as five special prizes at the Seoul International Invention Fair. A delegation of 146 people, led by the Taiwan Invention Association, participated in the fair, taking with them 97 inventions. Taiwanese biotech company TCI won the grand prize, the highest award at the fair. Taipei City University of Science and Technology was the biggest winner among those in the delegation, taking home seven golds, three silvers and five bronzes, as well as two special prizes awarded by South Korea and Thailand. A special prize is given by a foreign country to an outstanding and interesting invention. Most of Taiwan’s entries this year were in the biotechnology category, the association said.
SOCIETY
One dead, 6 hurt in crash
A scooter driver died after being struck from behind by a car in Kaohsiung’s Sanmin District (三民) yesterday, the district’s second police precinct said. Six other people were injured in the collision, which occurred on Dingli Road at about 8am, police said. A 67-year-old woman surnamed Tseng (曾) allegedly hit eight scooter drivers from behind as they were waiting for the traffic light to change, police said. A male scooter driver who was pinned against a roadside transformer box by the vehicle was pronounced dead at the scene, police said, adding that Tseng had immediately been arrested.
TRANSPORTATION
MRT records 13bn rides
The Taipei MRT system recorded its 13 billionth passenger on Friday, with the individual able to travel free of charge on MRT trains for a year, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. The passenger, who entered Zhongxiao Fuxing Station at 7:50pm to travel to Xindian Station, also won a free night in the Crystal Resort at Sun Moon Lake’s presidential suite, which is worth NT$88,000, the company said in a statement. The five passengers who traveled before and after the winner would each receive a free 30-day TPass, TRTC said. The winners were decided based on the time they entered an MRT station using an electronic card, but also had to be registered MRT members, the company said. Passenger volume on the MRT system, which was introduced in 1996, is expected to top 700 million this year, it said.
CRIME
Migrants arrested for drugs
Two Vietnamese who went missing from their legally designated place of employment have been arrested, during which narcotics were seized from them, Taichung police said yesterday. The two suspects, surnamed Chu and Nguyen, were arrested in late September after a tip-off was received about their whereabouts, police said. Officers disguised themselves as buyers and contacted Chu, 29, and Nguyen, 26, and set up a meeting for a drug deal at a karaoke bar where the arrests were made, police said. The suspects were caught with a variety of drugs, including ketamine and amphetamines, as well as NT$30,000 in cash, they said. Chu and Nguyen worked at a processing factory, but left in October last year after complaining of low pay, police said, adding that during interviews they admitted to later selling drugs to make a living. Meanwhile, a court granted a request by prosecutors to detain the two suspects, as they are being investigated for contravening the Narcotics Hazard Prevention Act (毒品危害防制條例).
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
RSS