SOCIETY
Students shine at Robofest
Students from Taiwan won four categories at the Robofest World Championship in the US. They were competing against teams that qualified for the event from regional competitions in 21 other countries and nine US states. The Taipei Economic and Cultural Office said on Facebook yesterday said that Taiwanese students won the most popular award in the Exhibition Junior category, and first place in the Exhibition Senior and Game Senior categories. They also won the Junior Bottle Sumo category, in which teams of one robot try to push each other or a bottle off a platform. Twelve Taiwanese teams, comprising nearly 50 students from elementary school upward, participated in the competition at Lawrence Technological University in Michigan.
Photo courtesy of Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Chicago
POLITICS
Tsai awards 13 top officials
President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday conferred medals on Vice President William Lai (賴清德) and 12 other officials at the Presidential Office, in recognition of their hard work, which she said had left a better Taiwan for the world. Tsai, set to complete her second presidential term on Monday next week, awarded Lai, the president-elect, the Order of Dr Sun Yat-sen with Grand Cordon and the Order of Propitious Clouds with Special Grand Cordon. Premier Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) was awarded the Order of Propitious Clouds with Special Grand Cordon. Vice Premier Cheng Wen-tsan (鄭文燦), Presidential Office Secretary-General Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍), Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) and Examination Yuan Secretary-General Liu Chien-sin (劉建忻) were honored with the Order of Brilliant Star with Special Grand Cordon. Vice president-elect Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴), Minister of National Defense Chiu Kuo-cheng (邱國正), Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Tai-san (邱太三) and Stanley Kao (高碩泰), a former top envoy to the US, were among those who received the Order of Brilliant Star with Grand Cordon.
Photo courtesy of Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Chicago
CRIME
Triple murder suspect held
The New Taipei District Court yesterday approved a request by prosecutors to detain and hold incommunicado a man suspected of murdering his wife, stepson and mother-in-law in the city’s Sanchong District (三重). The 24-year-old suspect, surnamed Chang (張), was detained due to the severity of the case and the risk that he could try to flee or destroy evidence. Chang was arrested in Taichung on Sunday after his 30-year-old wife, surnamed Chen (陳), her 69-year-old mother, surnamed Liu (劉), and his three-year-old stepson were found dead at a residence on Saturday night, police said. A woman identified as Liu’s oldest daughter said she was unable to contact her mother for several days, police said. Police said Chang admitted during questioning that he had murdered them over a financial dispute.
SOCIETY
Indonesians wed en masse
Twenty-nine Indonesian couples on Sunday took part in a mass wedding event in Taipei that was held to reduce the number of unregistered marriages among Indonesians in Taiwan. After attending a ceremony of about 20 minutes featuring readings from the Koran, each couple spent 15 minutes processing documents before receiving an official marriage certificate issued by the Indonesian Ministry of Religious Affairs. Sunday’s event was the third mass wedding event organized by the Indonesian Economic and Trade Office to Taipei since the beginning of last year.
INFRASTRUCTURE: Work on the second segment, from Kaohsiung to Pingtung, is expected to begin in 2028 and be completed by 2039, the railway bureau said Planned high-speed rail (HSR) extensions would blanket Taiwan proper in four 90-minute commute blocs to facilitate regional economic and livelihood integration, Railway Bureau Deputy Director-General Yang Cheng-chun (楊正君) said in an interview published yesterday. A project to extend the high-speed rail from Zuoying Station in Kaohsiung to Pingtung County’s Lioukuaicuo Township (六塊厝) is the first part of the bureau’s greater plan to expand rail coverage, he told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). The bureau’s long-term plan is to build a loop to circle Taiwan proper that would consist of four sections running from Taipei to Hualien, Hualien to
A relatively large earthquake may strike within the next two weeks, following a magnitude 5.2 temblor that shook Taitung County this morning, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. An earthquake struck at 8:18am today 10.2km west of Taitung County Hall in Taitung City at a relatively shallow depth of 6.5km, CWA data showed. The largest intensity of 4 was felt in Taitung and Pingtung counties, which received an alert notice, while areas north of Taichung did not feel any shaking, the CWA said. The earthquake was the result of the collision between the Philippine Plate and the Eurasian Plate, the agency said, adding
Snow fell in the mountainous areas of northern, central and eastern Taiwan in the early hours of yesterday, as cold air currents moved south. In the northern municipality of Taoyuan, snow started falling at about 6am in Fusing District (復興), district head Su Tso-hsi (蘇佐璽) said. By 10am, Lalashan National Forest Recreation Area, as well as Hualing (華陵), Sanguang (三光) and Gaoyi (高義) boroughs had seen snowfall, Su said. In central Taiwan, Shei-Pa National Park in Miaoli County and Hehuanshan National Forest Recreation Area in Nantou County saw snowfall of 5cm and 6cm respectively, by 10am, staff at the parks said. It began snowing
The 2025 Kaohsiung Wonderland–Winter Amusement Park event has teamed up with the Japanese manga series Chiikawa this year for its opening at Love River Bay yesterday, attracting more than 10,000 visitors, the city government said. Following the success of the “2024 Kaohsiung Wonderland” collaboration with a giant inflatable yellow duck installation designed by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman, this year the Kaohsiung Tourism Bureau collaborated with Chiikawa by Japanese illustrator Nagano to present two giant inflatable characters. Two inflatable floats — the main character, Chiikwa, a white bear-like creature with round ears, and Hachiware, a white cat with a blue-tipped tail
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