DIPLOMACY
Thrower starts at AIT
Pope Thrower on Wednesday started his role as spokesman for the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT). Thrower was director for public engagement at the US embassy in Seoul prior to joining the AIT, which represents Washington’s interests in Taiwan in the absence of official diplomatic ties. His previous overseas assignments also included serving as spokesman for the US embassy in Hanoi and assistant spokesman at its embassy in Islamabad, the AIT said in a statement yesterday afternoon. Thrower has also served in Chengdu, China, and held Washington-based roles at the Pakistan Desk and the Sri Lanka and Maldives Desk, it said. In the same statement, the AIT introduced its new deputy spokesman, Andy Dilbert, who took office on Friday last week. Dilbert served as spokesman at the US embassy in Algeria before joining the AIT. His other assignments outside the US include serving as cultural and educational attache in Haiti and deputy cultural attache in Israel, the statement said.
CRIME
E-cigarette arrests made
A Taiwanese couple have been arrested on suspicion of unlawfully importing materials to produce e-cigarette cartridges, the National Police Agency’s Third Special Police Corps said on Wednesday. In December last year, it received information about a group led by a man surnamed Chang (張) that was operating a large e-cigarette factory in Taichung, the corps said. During an investigation, the group relocated its operations multiple times, the corps said. In late May, a task force raided three locations in Taichung, arresting Chang and his female partner, surnamed Lee (李), and detaining six Thai women who had overstayed their tourist visas, it said. The task force seized 940,000 e-cigarette cartridges, 13,298 vape pens, three large barrels of nicotine and 306 cans of flavorings, it said. The material had a combined estimated value of NT$140.6 million (US$4.28 million), it added. The task force also confiscated more than NT$10.15 million in cash, it said. The corps said that the suspects illegally imported nicotine and flavorings from China, mixed them with base liquids and unidentified compounds, and packaged them into cartridges and refill bottles. The suspects set up an online sales system using fake accounts to evade taxes, the corps said.
CRIME
Canadian man indicted
A Canadian was indicted on Thursday for allegedly smuggling a large amount of cannabis into Taiwan, the Taoyuan District Prosecutors’ Office said. The office said in its indictment that the 31-year-old Canadian man, surnamed Awram, is suspected of conspiring with a man using the pseudonym David Du to smuggle the drugs into Taiwan. Du arranged flight tickets and accommodation, while Awram was responsible for bringing the marijuana into the country, it said, adding that he was to be paid C$2,000 to C$8,000 (US$1,441 to US$5,765) for his role. Awram was carrying 21 packets of cannabis with a net weight of 19.8kg in two suitcases as well as NT$12,700 and C$200 in cash when he arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport on March 29, the indictment said. On March 28, suitcases were handed to Awram by Du, who accompanied Awram to Vancouver International Airport to check the luggage, it said. He also gave Awram C$700, it added. Awram was charged with contraventions of the Narcotics Hazard Prevention Act (毒品危害防制條例), prosecutors said. Due to the large quantity of cannabis involved, a prison sentence of 14 years and a fine of NT$100,000 was being sought, the office said.
Police have issued warnings against traveling to Cambodia or Thailand when others have paid for the travel fare in light of increasing cases of teenagers, middle-aged and elderly people being tricked into traveling to these countries and then being held for ransom. Recounting their ordeal, one victim on Monday said she was asked by a friend to visit Thailand and help set up a bank account there, for which they would be paid NT$70,000 to NT$100,000 (US$2,136 to US$3,051). The victim said she had not found it strange that her friend was not coming along on the trip, adding that when she
TRAGEDY: An expert said that the incident was uncommon as the chance of a ground crew member being sucked into an IDF engine was ‘minuscule’ A master sergeant yesterday morning died after she was sucked into an engine during a routine inspection of a fighter jet at an air base in Taichung, the Air Force Command Headquarters said. The officer, surnamed Hu (胡), was conducting final landing checks at Ching Chuan Kang (清泉崗) Air Base when she was pulled into the jet’s engine for unknown reasons, the air force said in a news release. She was transported to a hospital for emergency treatment, but could not be revived, it said. The air force expressed its deepest sympathies over the incident, and vowed to work with authorities as they
A tourist who was struck and injured by a train in a scenic area of New Taipei City’s Pingsi District (平溪) on Monday might be fined for trespassing on the tracks, the Railway Police Bureau said yesterday. The New Taipei City Fire Department said it received a call at 4:37pm on Monday about an incident in Shifen (十分), a tourist destination on the Pingsi Railway Line. After arriving on the scene, paramedics treated a woman in her 30s for a 3cm to 5cm laceration on her head, the department said. She was taken to a hospital in Keelung, it said. Surveillance footage from a
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
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