CROSS-STRAIT
Chinese students coming
Former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) foundation yesterday said the central government had approved its application to invite a group of Chinese students to visit Taiwan. Foundation CEO Hsiao Hsu-tsen (蕭旭岑) said in a statement that the 40 students from seven universities would be led by China Tsinghua University Committee Secretary of the Communist Party Qiu Yong (邱勇). The visiting students would include double Olympic table tennis champion Ma Long (馬龍) of Beijing Sport University, and 2020 Tokyo Olympic shooting gold medalist Yang Qian (楊倩) of Tsinghua University. They are expected to arrive on Nov. 27 and depart on Dec. 5. Hsiao said the government approval is meaningful at a time of increasingly tense cross-strait relations. The Mainland Affairs Council on Thursday said that no major flaws were identified during the application review, and that it would ask the visiting group that no political statements be made and no actions detrimental to Taiwan’s status be taken.
TECHNOLOGY
More funding coming
The government has allocated NT$196.5 billion (US$6.1 billion) in next year’s budget to support the tech industry, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said on Thursday. Speaking at the EdTech Taiwan at the Taipei World Trade Center, Cho said the government plans to “make step-by-step efforts” to transform Taiwan into a “digital nation and ‘smart’ island.” The government has earmarked NT$14.6 billion for the semiconductor industry, NT$10.1 billion for net-zero technology, NT$9.4 billion for artificial intelligence (AI), NT$6 billion for aerospace and communications industries and NT$5.3 billion for digital humanities, Cho said. The remainder of the tech budget would be spent on areas including the arms industry, security-related technologies and next-generation communications, he added. “Through its policy approach, the Executive Yuan hopes to establish Taiwan’s sovereign AI and enter the era of AI applications,” the premier said. Next year’s proposed budget represents an increase of more than 25 percent from the NT$156.9 billion allocated for this year.
TRANSPORT
Speed limit increased
The Danhai Light Rail Transit in New Taipei City has significantly improved service efficiency between the two stations by increasing the speed limit sixfold. Starting yesterday, light rail trains on the elevated section between Xinshi 1st Road Station and Danjin Beixin (Beitouzi) Station can travel up to 60kph, operator New Taipei Metro said in a statement. The two stations are 470m apart, and the higher speed limit reduces travel time by about one minute, it said, adding that the change was made possible by covering rarely used railroad switches between the stations.
Taiwanese can file complaints with the Tourism Administration to report travel agencies if their activities caused termination of a person’s citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday, after a podcaster highlighted a case in which a person’s citizenship was canceled for receiving a single-use Chinese passport to enter Russia. The council is aware of incidents in which people who signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of Russia were told they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, Chiu told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Taipei. However, the travel agencies actually applied
Japanese footwear brand Onitsuka Tiger today issued a public apology and said it has suspended an employee amid allegations that the staff member discriminated against a Vietnamese customer at its Taipei 101 store. Posting on the social media platform Threads yesterday, a user said that an employee at the store said that “those shoes are very expensive” when her friend, who is a migrant worker from Vietnam, asked for assistance. The employee then ignored her until she asked again, to which she replied: "We don't have a size 37." The post had amassed nearly 26,000 likes and 916 comments as of this
New measures aimed at making Taiwan more attractive to foreign professionals came into effect this month, the National Development Council said yesterday. Among the changes, international students at Taiwanese universities would be able to work in Taiwan without a work permit in the two years after they graduate, explainer materials provided by the council said. In addition, foreign nationals who graduated from one of the world’s top 200 universities within the past five years can also apply for a two-year open work permit. Previously, those graduates would have needed to apply for a work permit using point-based criteria or have a Taiwanese company
The Shilin District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday indicted two Taiwanese and issued a wanted notice for Pete Liu (劉作虎), founder of Shenzhen-based smartphone manufacturer OnePlus Technology Co (萬普拉斯科技), for allegedly contravening 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) by poaching 70 engineers in Taiwan. Liu allegedly traveled to Taiwan at the end of 2014 and met with a Taiwanese man surnamed Lin (林) to discuss establishing a mobile software research and development (R&D) team in Taiwan, prosecutors said. Without approval from the government, Lin, following Liu’s instructions, recruited more than 70 software
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