Taiwan’s polls next year could usher in a president more assertive to Beijing, which could in turn respond by taking a tougher line.

The Straits Times
Date: Apr 15, 2015 8:35 AM
By: Hugh White, For The Straits Times

IT IS time to start worrying about Taiwan again.

In the past few years, it has slipped quietly into the background as tensions in the East

China Sea and South China Sea have posed more urgent threats to regional peace and stability. But now old questions about Taiwan’s longer-term future are re-emerging, and so are old fears that differences over Taiwan could rupture United States-China relations and drive Asia into a major crisis.

Taiwan’s status has been a highly sensitive issue between Washington and Beijing ever since 1949, when defeated nationalists withdrew to the island as the communists swept to power in the mainland. The differences were papered over only when US-China relations were opened up after 1972. Taiwan was left in an awkward limbo, neither accepting Beijing’s rule nor seeking recognition as an independent country.    [FULL  STORY]

Asia One
Date: Apr 14, 2015
By: AFP

TAIPEI, Taiwan said Tuesday hundreds of veterans who participated in the bloody battles during the Second Sino-Japanese War will be invited to the island’s first military parade marking the 70th anniversary of Japan’s defeat in 1945.

A total of 67 military aircraft, among them US-made F-16s and Apache attack helicopters, as well as French-made Mirage 2000-5s, will fly in formation at a military base in the northern Hsinchu county on July 4.

“Hundreds of veterans who had participated in the war against Japan, including some living in Taiwan and others abroad, will be invited,” defence ministry spokesman David Lo told reporters.     [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date: Apr 16, 2015
By: Stacy Hsu  /  Staff reporter

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is investigating which parties are responsible for

the falsification of country of origin documents for rose tea ingredients used by tea chain Stornaway (英國藍) that were found to be laced with pesticides.

Dubbed the “poison of the century,” dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT), can enter the human body via contaminated food, water and air, and can cause chronic effects on the nervous system, causing excitability, tremors and seizures.

Some research has also associated the pesticide, which has been banned by many countries, including Taiwan, since the 1970s, with increased risks of breast cancer.

A preliminary investigation by the agency showed that Stornaway purchased the tainted ingredients from Taipei-based Chou Chieh Trading Co (洲界貿易), which procured the products from its supplier, Kaohsiung-based Yuen Yeeh Enterprise Co (原宜貿易), FDA Director-General Chiang Yu-mei (姜郁美) said.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/04/15
By: Milly Lin and Evelyn Kao

Taipei, April 15 (CNA) The state-owned Taiwan Power Co. (Taipower, 台電) said Wednesday that if its coal-fired power plants are shut down, the country would face immediate power supply cuts on a rotational basis.

The company issued the warning a day after six city and county governments in central and southern Taiwan signed a pledge in support of a plan to ban the burning of bituminous coal and petroleum coke at local factories and power plants.

The plan, drafted by the Yunlin County government, was backed by Chiayi City, Tainan City, Changhua County, Taichung City and Chiayi County.     [FULL  STORY]

Want China Times
Date: 2015-04-15
By: CNA

Some 150 birders will participate in a bird race held in central Taiwan’s Dasyueshan, a

mountainous area known for its bird diversity, the organizer said Wednesday.

The participants, including five from Canada, will compete at the fifth Dasyueshan Bird Race on April 17-18, according to the Chinese Wild Bird Federation.

During the race, the largest and longest-running birding competition in Taiwan, birders will compete in teams to see or hear the greatest number of bird species over a 24-hour time frame at the Dasyueshan National Forest Recreation Area.

Between 10:30am April 17 and 10:30am April 18, the birders could have a chance to be treated with courtship displays of the magnificent Mikado and Swinhoe’s Pheasants at the country’s top birding site, said campaign manager Chiu Po-ying.     [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date: Apr 16, 2015
By: Abraham Gerber  /  Staff reporter

The Taipei City Government has been almost “completely infiltrated,” Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je

(柯文哲) said yesterday in response to reports of leaks said to have reached Farglory Land Development Co.

Media reports yesterday quoted unnamed sources as saying that Farglory had gained access to the results of the city’s investigation into the Taipei Dome project, enabling it to issue a “full rebuttal” in a news release earlier this month.

Taipei Deputy Mayor Charles Lin (林欽榮) said that he had leaked nothing and “did not know where the spy was.”

City councilors condemned what they described as selective leaks of city documents.

Ko on Tuesday said that some computers in the mayor’s office had been hacked by unknown agents.

Epoch Times
Date: April 14, 2015
By Joshua Philipp, Epoch Times

The Chinese regime’s purchase of the Russian S-400 missile defense systems has gone

through, which will give it air dominance over Taiwan.

News of the sale began to circulate on Russian news outlets on April 13. The S-400 can launch up to 72 missiles and simultaneously engage 36 targets up to 248 miles away.

The Chinese regime is currently using Russia’s previous missile defense system, the S-300. They’ve been negotiating with Russia to purchase the S-400 since 2010.

When negotiations for the purchase were still taking place, DefenseNews reported that Taiwan could be the country most affected by the sale. It noted the S-400 will give the Chinese regime “complete air defense coverage of Taiwan.”

The missile defense system would significantly affect the Taiwanese air force if there were an armed conflict with Mainland China.     [FULL  STORY]

Japan Times
Date: Apr 14, 2015
By Reiji Yoshida

TAIPEI – The government on Tuesday called Taiwan’s plan to tighten regulations on Japanese food imports because of fears of radioactive contamination “extremely regrettable.”

The top government spokesman called on Taipei to use what he called “scientific findings” in drafting its rules.

“So far we have explained safety of foods produced in Japan and asked (Taiwan) to make judgment based on scientific findings,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told a news conference. “It’s extremely regrettable that Taiwan will strengthen regulations this time.”

On Monday, Taipei said it will introduce new regulations, possibly in mid-May, requiring all food imported from Japan to carry labeling declaring which prefecture it came from.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/04/14
By: Lung Pei-ning, Jay Chen and Elizabeth Hsu

Taipei, April 14 (CNA) One person was diagnosed with cancer in Taiwan every 5 minutes and 26 seconds in 2012, a new record that was 14 seconds faster than the previous year, according to cancer statistics released by the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) on Tuesday.

The number of new cancer patients in 2012 increased by 4,012 from the previous year to a record 96,694, said the administration under the Ministry of Health and Welfare in summarizing the latest data on cancer in Taiwan.

HPA Director-General Chiou Shu-ti (邱淑媞) cited an analysis of the data as saying that the incidence of new cancer diagnoses in Taiwan in 2012 was 415 cases for every 100,000 people, or one in every 223.     [FULL  STORY]

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Date: April 14, 2015
BY Joel Landau

A woman in Taiwan ordered strippers to perform at her husband’s funeral as a final gift to her deceased life partner.

Two women dressed in white and knee-high boots were hired to perform at the ceremony Sunday performing what The People’s Daily described as a “coffin feather dance.”

The woman, identified only as Jane, said her husband loved beautiful women and arranged for these drop-dead gorgeous entertainers to surprise those in attendance.

The strippers performed for three songs during the ceremony, which unexpectedly featured dance music. The performers disrobed a towel revealing a bikini.

They also gyrated around and on the coffin, according to PzFeed.

The performance snapped a few people out of their grief as they began filming the peep show with their phones.

But the service did conclude with a somber drumbeat as the attendees escorted the coffin to the gravesite, the newspaper reported.     [FULL  STORY]