Mooncakes and pomelos given to animals at Taipei Zoo to celebrate Mid-Autumn Festival

Taiwan News
Date: 2018/09/24
By: Scott Morgan, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – In celebration of Mid-Autumn Festival, animals at Taipei Zoo were treated to a feast of pomelos and specially-made mooncakes on Sept. 24.

Mooncakes were given to members of the big cat family, and to the pandas, while pomelo was given to the zoo’s Formosan black bears and gorillas.

The Mid-Autumn Festival is one of the most important occasions for Taiwanese people, bringing together family and friends to enjoy barbecues, delicacies, mooncakes and pomelos. The festival, which has a history of over 3,000 years, took place on Sep. 24 this year.

The specially-made mooncakes were made from bamboo leaves, carrots, apple, and grapes. An additional mooncake with a special filling was also made, said Taipei Zoo.
[FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/09/24
By: Chen Wei-ting, Tyson Lu and Flor Wang

Taipei, Sept. 24 (CNA) Typhoon Trami has developed into a super typhoon and could start affecting Taiwan on Friday, according to the Central Weather Bureau.

Trami, which was upgraded into a super typhoon at around 2 p.m., was located 1,080 kilometers east-southeast from Taiwan’s southernmost tip, bureau data showed. It was moving in a west-northwesterly direction toward Japan’s Ryukyu Islands at a speed of 17 kilometers per hour.

There is a chance that Trami will make landfall on Taiwan, but many variables still exist that could affect the storm’s path, the bureau said.    [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date: Sep 25, 2018
By: Lee I-chia  /  Staff reporter

The Taipei City Government is mulling enforcing a ban on barbecuing at riverside parks

and other public sites, but would not do so until it has held more discussions on the issue or conducted an online poll.

While barbecuing has become a tradition for the Mid-Autumn Festival in Taiwan in recent years, city regulations ban barbecuing in city parks or on public lawns.

The city government has issued notices about designated barbecue sites in riverside parks ahead of the holiday for more than a decade, but did not do so this year.

Instead it only posted a notice on Thursday on the Hydraulic Engineering Office’s Frequently Asked Questions Web site, which stated that barbecuing would be allowed in 19 areas, including seven that are open for barbecues year-round and 12 areas where it would be allowed over the Mid-Autumn Festival holiday weekend.    [FULL  STORY]

Berlin Hair Salon’s owner says the logo is meant to look like four stylized razors

HAARETZ
Date: Sep 23, 2018  
Date: JTA  

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A hair salon in northern Taiwan covered the logos on its store signs, which resemble a swastika, after people angry about the image began urinating and defecating in front of the store in protest.

Hsu Chen-yang, owner of the Berlin Hair Salon in Hsinchu City, told the Taiwan News that he covered the symbols, which he said were supposed to look like four razor blades, with black marker after the protests against the logo grew more intense.

Though Chen-yang claims the logo is meant to look like four stylized razors, a previous version of the hair salon’s logo from last year featured the Reichsadler Imperial Eagle at the top of the image.    [FULL  STORY]

State media reports alleging espionage by self-ruled island ‘intended as a warning’, former deputy defence minister of Taiwan says

South China Morning Post 
Date: 23 September, 2018
By: Kinling Lo

Beijing’s claims that Taipei has been blackmailing mainland students at Taiwanese universities to spy for the self-ruled island reflect the increasingly fraught relationship between the two sides, observers said.

In the past week, mainland Chinese state media have reported that the authorities had “cracked” more than 100 espionage cases involving the self-ruled island since 2011, including several of them allegedly operated from college campuses.

The coverage began with a September 15 report by state broadcaster China Central Television that focused on three cases of alleged spying. The report identified the suspects and detailed their operations.

“Mainland students in Taiwan are far away from home and therefore have a strong desire to make friends. Taiwan’s intelligence agents made use of this,” the report said.

Beijing tells Taiwan to halt all spying and ‘sabotage’ in mainland China
Beijing’s ties with Taipei have been under pressure since Tsai Ing-wen from the independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party was elected the island’s president in 2016, and those tensions might have been a catalyst for the mainland’s allegations of espionage.    [FULL  STORY]

The young child was restrained by zip ties on an enclosed balcony, and driven by hunger to eat his own feces

Taiwan News
Date: 2018/09/23
By:  Duncan DeAeth, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – A case of serious child abuse has been reported in Taiwan’s

Hsinchu County.

A three year old boy was left tied up on a enclosed balcony with zip-ties around his upper arms, and was left there for hours. He was reportedly there long enough to have defecated and be driven by hunger to eat his own feces.

The boy’s neglectful father and a partner, who is not the boy’s mother, were responsible for the abuse according to the reports.

The boy was discovered bound on the balcony by his mother, who came to visit out of concern for her children.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/09/23
By Lee Hsin-Yin, CNA staff reporter 

September marks a new beginning not only for students as they return to school, but also

for 62-year-old Chang Yue-mei (張月美), a “Big Issue Taiwan” magazine vendor who is ready for the peak season of her job.

“I enjoy being with the kids and seeing the world outside. It makes me feel that I am part of them,” said Chang, who sells the magazines at the National Central University in Taoyuan.

Like many of her companions selling the magazine, an overseas project from The Big Issue magazine, which was first published in the United Kingdom in 1991, Chang is socially disadvantaged and relies on the job to make ends meet.

Chang has suffered from polio since she was a child and is confined to a wheelchair.
[FULL  STORY]

OCTOBER RITE: Six ‘blesseds’ are to be made saints on Oct. 14, including pope Paul VI, and President Tsai Ing-wen designated Chen Chien-jen to represent Taiwan

Taipei Times
Date: Sep 24, 2018
By: Su Yung-yao, Lu Yi-hsuan, and William Hetherington  /  Staff reporters, with staff writer

Vice President Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) is scheduled to visit the Vatican next month to

attend the canonization of six beatified individuals, or “blesseds,” a source said.

The Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) reported on the planned visit on Friday, one day before the Vatican and China signed a deal on the appointment of bishops, an issue that for decades has caused tensions between the Holy See and Beijing.

The Vatican is the only European state to recognize the Republic of China and is one of the nation’s remaining diplomatic allies.

While some media outlets have speculated that Saturday’s deal would lead to the Vatican’s breaking ties with Taiwan, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs the same day said the Vatican had assured Taipei that the agreement “is not of a political or diplomatic nature, and will not affect the diplomatic relationship that has been in place for 76 years between Taiwan and the Holy See.”    [FULL  STORY]

WSB-TV
Date: Sep 22, 2018
By: Bob D’Angelo, Cox Media Group National Content Desk

3D-printed gun creator wanted on child sex charge arrested at Taiwan hotel
The creator of the 3D-printed gun was arrested Friday in Taiwan after being accused of sexual assault in Texas, CNN reported Saturday.

A warrant to arrest Cody Wilson, 30, was issued earlier this week after allegations that he had sex with a 16-year-old girl he met on an adult dating site, according to police. Austin Police Cmdr. Troy Officer said Wilson met the girl Aug. 15 at a coffee shop after communicating with her on SugarDaddyMeet.com, took her to a hotel and paid her $500 for sex, CNN reported.

The age of consent in Texas is 17.

According to CNA, Taiwan’s state news agency, Wilson was arrested at a hotel in Taipei on Friday. Wilson’s passport has been revoked, and Taiwanese authorities plan to deport him to the United States to face the charge, according to Huffington Post.
[FULL  STORY]

Beijing’s top diplomat denies ‘targeting any third party’ following accusations of economic incentives for countries to switch allegiance from Taipei

South China Morning Post 
Date: 22 September, 2018
By: Reuters

China’s most senior envoy inaugurated a new embassy in the Dominican Republic on Friday after the Caribbean country cut ties with Taiwan in a move that prompted US concern over the island’s dwindling number of allies.

Self-ruled Taiwan, which China claims as its own, now has formal relations with only 17 countries, almost all of them small and less developed nations in Central America and the Pacific, including Belize and Nauru.

“We have witnessed a historic breakthrough,” said Chinese State Councillor Wang Yi, the government’s top diplomat, in an speech televised by Chinese state media.

Along with the Dominican Republic’s decision in May, Panama and El Salvador have also switched recognition to Beijing in the past two years.

The United States recalled its top diplomats from those countries and warned that China was offering economic incentives in a bid for domination.    [FULL  STORY]