Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/04/28
By: Elaine Hou

Taipei, April 28 (CNA) The National Day firework show this year to celebrate the

Republic of China’s 104th birthday is set to take place in the southern city of Kaohsiung, Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平), chairman of the national day celebration committee, said Tuesday.

The show will be held Oct. 10, the ROC National Day, according to Wang.

It has been 15 years since Kaohsiung hosted the National Day fireworks, Wang said, explaining the decision to hold the event in the southern port city.

He made the remarks when speaking to the media before convening the first meeting in preparation for this year’s National Day fireworks.     [FULL  STORY]

Want China Times
Date: 2015-04-28
By: CNA

US Secretary of State John Kerry recently reiterated Washington’s commitment

to helping Taiwan defend itself under the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA) and also commended a peace initiative proposed by President Ma Ying-jeou to address territorial disputes in the region.

Consistent with the TRA, “we continue to make available defense articles and services to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability,” Kerry said in a written statement in response to questions from the House Committee of Foreign Affairs.

The TRA was enacted in 1979 to maintain commercial, cultural and other unofficial relations between the US and Taiwan after Washington switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing. The TRA also requires the US “to provide Taiwan with arms of a defensive character.”     [FULL STORY]

PROPRIETARY:A spokesperson for Taipower said that maintenance records could be examined only at its offices, because they are the intellectual property of Hitachi

Taipei Times
Date: Apr 29, 2015
By: Sean Lin and Lo Hsin-chen  /  Staff reporters

The Pingtung County Government yesterday said that it is considering filing a

lawsuit against Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) over the company’s failure to report an accident on Saturday in which an auxiliary power converter outside a nuclear reactor at the Ma-anshan (馬鞍山) Nuclear Power Plant caught fire.

The county government also called on the Atomic Energy Council to impose a severe punishment on the plant’s administrators for negligence, which it said had threatened public safety.

“Accidents at the Ma-anshan power plant do not affect Taipower alone, they affect all of Pingtung County and all Taiwanese,” county government spokesperson Huang Chien-chia (黃建嘉) told a news conference yesterday.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/04/28
By: Su Lung-chi, Sunrise Huang, Chen Ching-fang, Tien Yu-bin and
Maubo Chang

Taipei, April 28 (CNA) A medical team organized by the Buddhist Compassion Relief Tzu Chi Foundation arrived in the Nepalese capital of Kathmandu Tuesday in the wake of a magnitude-7.8 tremor that ravaged the South Asian Country April 25, killing more than 5,000 people.

In a press release issued by its headquarters in Hualien, the foundation said that the 15-member team, led by Taichung Tzu Chi Hospital superintendent Chien Shou-hsin (簡守信), has brought with them 1,000 kg of medicines, enough to treat well over 1,000 patients.

As the plane carrying the team touched down at the Kathmandu airport, two other planes carrying rescue teams from the United States, Singapore, Israel and Pakistan also arrived, forming long lines in the lobby of the terminal waiting to collect their rescue gear and luggage.     [FULL  STORY]

HEN-PECKED HERO?The man who has become a hit online might still need to persuade his wife, who said she was unsure she ‘had a real man’ prior to their trip

Taipei Times
Date: Apr 28, 2015
By: Tsai Tsung-hsien and Chen Wei-han  /  Staff reporter, with staff writer

Photographs of a Taiwanese man at an airport pulling two large suitcases,

carrying a baby strapped to his chest and wearing a collapsible baby pram on his back have gone viral, with Taiwanese and Japanese netizens calling him the ideal of Taiwanese manhood.

The man, an employee at a bed-and-breakfast in Pingtung County, who prefers to be known only as Charles, said he inadvertently became an overnight sensation after his wife uploaded photographs of him carrying all their luggage during a family trip to Japan in January.

He said that he offered to plan the trip and carry all the luggage because his wife was three months pregnant.

He did not mind when the weight of the luggage increased with the purchase of souvenirs midway through the trip, even though the combined weight of his daughter, her equipment and the suitcases was about 55kg, he said.     [FULL  STORY]

Time
Date: April 27, 2015
By: Emily Rauhala / Beijing @emilyrauhala

Even with survivors still being pulled from the rubble, geopolitical ramifications loom large

China this weekend rushed a 62-person team to Nepal to help with the ongoing search rescue operation after Saturday’s 7.9-magnitude earthquake. They landed in Kathmandu early Sunday and set to work immediately, according to Chinese state media. The rescuers and a second group from the People’s Liberation Army are both well-equipped to help in the desperate search for survivors of a disaster that has already claimed more than 3,600 lives: Some are veterans of the devastating 2008 Sichuan earthquake, which had a 70,000 death toll, and they bring much-needed supplies.

Not making the trip just yet: a team from Taiwan. Though dozens of Taiwanese were still missing in Nepal, and Taiwan has strong capabilities in disaster recovery and relief, the island was not asked to participate, Vice Foreign Minister Andrew Kao said Monday. (Taiwan NGOs and religious groups do plan to go and Taiwan people have already raised a large sum of money to support the recovery effort.)     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/04/27
By: Lu Hsin-hui and Maubo Chang

Taipei, April 27 (CNA) A defense and disaster prevention drill, code-named Wan’an No. 38, will be held in the six cities and counties in northern Taiwan on Tuesday, according to the Ministry of National Defense.

After sirens sound at 1:30 p.m. in Taipei, New Taipei, Keelung, Taoyuan and Hsinchu cities and Hsinchu and Yilan counties, pedestrians and vehicles will have to stay off the road as ordered by soldiers, police and civil defense workers at the time, the ministry said.

High-speed trains, Taipei Metro trains, and flights, however, will not be affected by the drill.     [FULL STORY]

Want China Times
Date: 2015-04-27
By: CNA

Nepal has declined Taiwan’s offer to help with search and rescue efforts after

the Himalayan country was devastated by a magnitude 7.8 earthquake Saturday, Vice Foreign Minister Andrew Kao said Monday.

Kao’s comments came as several local search and rescue teams were preparing to depart for Nepal to help look for survivors under collapsed buildings.

Answering questions at the Legislative Yuan, the vice minister did not give reasons for Nepal’s rejection, saying only that Kathmandu so far has only asked for assistance in search and rescue efforts from neighboring countries like China, India and Pakistan.

Taiwan will still send an advanced team to Nepal, however, to assess the need for medical assistance, which Taiwan stands ready to provide, said Kao.

Taipei Times
Date: Apr 28, 2015
By: Lauly Li  /  Staff reporter

One of the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant’s two reactors was shut down

yesterday after a fire late on Sunday night involving an auxiliary electrical transformer in a non-nuclear area of the Pingtung County plant, state-run Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) said.

Taipower said the fire began inside a transformer outside the second reactor and a fire alarm was triggered at 11:58pm on Sunday. The fire was extinguished by the plant’s automatic sprinkler system within 17 minutes, it said.

“The incident did not cause a radioactive leak. The body of the second reactor was not affected by the incident, but for safety reasons we have suspended its operation until the damaged parts of the power transmission system are repaired,” Taipower spokesman Lin Te-fu (林德福) told a press conference in Taipei.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 02015/04/27
By: Hsieh Chia-chen and S.C. Chang

Taipei, April 27 (CNA) A first batch of relief supplies from Taiwan will arrive in Nepal on Tuesday to contribute to relief efforts in the Himalayan country devastated by a magnitude-7.8 earthquake last week, Foreign Minister David Lin said Monday.

After checking with Nepalese authorities, Taiwan will be sending blankets, water, dried foods and medical supplies to areas recovering from the aftermath of the strongest quake to strike Nepal since 1934, Lin said at a press briefing.

Vice Premier Chang Shan-cheng said an eight-member advance team of medical and foreign affairs experts will also be on the plane with the humanitarian assistance to get a better feel for Nepal’s medical needs.     [FULL  STORY]