HAPPY ACCIDENT: The discovery was made when the team sent a sampler to a seamount 1.2km under the surface of the ocean, the science ministry said

Taipei Times
Date: Jun 24, 2018
By: Lin Chia-nan  /  Staff reporter

A team of Taiwanese and French researchers has extracted frozen methane hydrates

known as “combustible ice” from under the seabed off Taiwan’s southwestern coast, the Ministry of Science and Technology said on Friday, hailing the achievement as a milestone for the nation’s energy exploration.

The team made the extraction on Thursday at 3:52am in waters near 22° north latitude and 120° east longitude on board the French research vessel Marion Dufresne, the ministry said.

The team used a core sampler to reach a seamount 1.2km below the ocean’s surface and the researchers found that the sampler had scooped up a piece of methane ice, it said.

The discovery was unexpected, as the team originally aimed to evaluate seabed stability in the area, said National Central University (NCU) Department of Earth Sciences professor Lin Jing-yi (林靜怡), who led the project.

The project is part of the second phase of the ministry’s National Energy Program, Lin said, adding that she did not join the voyage herself.

The combustible ice would be kept in Taiwan for further study, in accordance with an agreement with French scientists, Lin said.    [FULL  STORY]

The Sydney Morning Herald
Date: 22 June 2018
By: David Wroe

The Turnbull government has signed a deal to send refugees on Nauru who need urgent medical care to Taiwan, in an undisclosed arrangement aimed at stopping them from applying to stay in Australia after being treated in local hospitals.

Fairfax Media can reveal Australia signed a memorandum of understanding with Taiwan – which is not a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention – in September last year that has so far seen about five refugees flown 5500 kilometres to the capital Taipei for high-level care.

Refugees on Nauru who need urgent medical treatment are being sent to Taipei in Taiwan instead of Australia.

The previously undisclosed deal has prompted lawyers to warn that medical care is being dictated by the political imperative of avoiding having refugees on Nauru reach Australia, where they can access its court system.

In recent months, a 55-year-old Iranian woman in need of critical heart surgery has been among the people treated in Taiwan and then returned to Nauru. A 63-year-old Afghan man who is reportedly dying of lung cancer is refusing to move to Taiwan for palliative care, demanding instead to come to Australia.    [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 2018-06-22

President Tsai Ing-wen says pressure from China will not change Taiwan’s

determination to raise its profile in the global community.

President Tsai Ing-wen on Friday met scholars from the Brookings Institution, a Washington-based think tank.

Tsai said there have recently been changes in the Taiwan Strait, the South China Sea and the Korean peninsula. But she said Taiwan is a responsible member of the global community and has been working hard to maintain cross-strait status quo to ensure peace and prosperity in the Asia-Pacific region.
[FULL  STORY]

Unregulated Masses hand over black box to police which may contain Huashan Grassland murder victim’s breasts

Taiwan News
Date: 2018/06/22
By: Keoni Everington, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — After a collective of artists called Unregulated Masses (野青眾)

dismantled their camp on the Huashan Grassland  (華山大草原) this morning (June 22), they handed over to police a black box which they suspect could contain the breasts of the woman murdered in the tent village late last month, reported Apple Daily. 

Before personnel from Taipei City were slated to arrive at 9 a.m. this morning to tear down the remains of a village made from tents on the grounds of Huashan Grassland, which Unregulated Masses named 120 Grassroots (120草原自治區), the leader of the collective, a man surnamed Chuang (莊), called on members to gather at 7 a.m. to take down their tents and gather their belongings. In the process, one of the group’s members stumbled on a black box which did not belong to anyone on the scene.

They hastily notified the police, and officers and forensic experts quickly arrived on the scene as they suspect that the box may contain the woman’s missing breasts. Authorities immediately sealed off the area and took relevant physical evidence and the black box into the forensics center for examination.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/06/22
By Ozzy Yin and Lee Hsin-Yin

New York, June 21 (CNA) A semi-official meeting between American and Chinese

representatives earlier this month has shown how wide the gap is in how they gauge recent developments in cross-Taiwan Strait relations, according to the conference report released Thursday.

During the annual conference of the Forum on Asia-Pacific Security held by the National Committee on American Foreign Policy, experts from the two sides had different takes on who is responsible for the gridlock in cross-strait ties over the past two years.

Several Chinese speakers reiterated at the meeting in New York on June 4-5 that the fundamental cause of rising cross-strait tensions was because Taiwan’s president, Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), has “damaged the political basis” of the relationship that had existed under the previous administration of Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九).    [FULL  STORY]

SHARED VALUES: The basis of the US-Taiwan relationship is a commitment to democracy and making positive contributions to the international system, Alex Wong said

Taipei Times
Date: Jun 23, 2018
By: Staff writer, with CNA, WASHINGTON

A US official on Thursday expressed concern over attempts by China to change the

“status quo” across the Taiwan Strait, as seen in Beijing’s escalating efforts to suppress Taiwan internationally.

US Department of State Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs Deputy Assistant Secretary Alex Wong (黃之瀚) pointed to recent actions taken by China to squeeze Taiwan’s international space to make contributions that benefit the international community, such as offering humanitarian assistance and taking part in the World Health Assembly.

“Stability in the region is dependent on the status quo across the Strait. So the US government is very concerned about any attempts to disturb that status quo,” Wong said during a discussion on US strategic competition in the Indo-Pacific region held as part of the annual conference of the Center for a New American Security.

Beyond the Taiwan Relations Act, the three US-China communiques and Washington’s “one China” policy, the basis of the US-Taiwan relationship is shared values, a commitment to democracy, a commitment to market economics and a commitment to making positive contributions to the international system, Wong said.
[FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 2018-06-21

A professor on the philosophy of law, Joseph Raz, has been named the recipient of

the 2018 Tang Prize in rule of law. The Taiwan-based Tang Prize Foundation made the announcement on Thursday.

The selection committee praised Raz’s representative works of “The Authority of Law”, “The Morality of Freedom”, and “Practical Reason and Norms”. He is an advocate of legal positivism which helps fill in what is lacking in the analysis of the philosophy of law.

Raz was born in Mandate Palestine in 1939. He taught at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem for 42 years. He is now a professor of law at Columbia Law School in the US and a research professor of law at King’s College London in the UK.    [FULL  STORY]

Despite hype over the potential for Washington to make a real statement about its support for Taiwan at the opening of the new AIT complex, the end result was familiarly low-key.

The News Lens
Date: 2018/06/21
By: Dean Karalekas

Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the official opening of the new compound housing the American institute in Taiwan (AIT), held to moderate fanfare on June 12, was just how unremarkable it was.

Despite talk that the event would be attended by National Security Advisor and noted China hawk John Bolton, those rumors proved to be unfounded, and in the end, the U.S. government sent a delegation led by Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs Marie Royce.

True, Royce is the highest-level U.S. official to visit Taiwan since Washington de-recognized Taipei in 1979, and she is married to Republican Ed Royce, who is a noted pro-Taiwan advocate in the U.S. Congress. Nevertheless, the lineup felt almost purposefully low-key.

Like the Bolton rumors, there had also been speculation that serving U.S. Marines would be stationed at the new compound to provide security, as is the task of Marines at U.S. embassies (those without the de facto prefix) around the world.
[FULL  STORY]

Education would be the key to prevent similar tragedies from happening again, said the premier 

Taiwan News
Date: 2018/06/21
By: Teng Pei-ju, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan Premier William Lai (賴清德) said Thursday society

needs to enhance education about gender equality and emotion management after three appalling murder cases were uncovered in a single month.

During an Executive Yuan session on Thursday morning, Lai said even though the country’s judicial system would hold the culprits accountable for their crime, education would be the key to prevent similar tragedies from happening again.

Education about gender equality and emotion management should be reinforced in academic institutions, the family, as well as the entire society, said the premier, adding that schools should also teach students to respect other people, regardless of their lives or autonomy.

Lai said the Ministry of Education and municipal governments should take on those tasks while law enforcement authorities work hand in hand to make the country a safer place.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/06/21
By: Elaine Hou and Ko Lin

Taipei, June 21 (CNA) Taiwan’s government is donating 1,000 metric tons of rice to Guatemala, one of its diplomatic allies, to support ongoing disaster relief efforts in the country following the Fuego volcano eruption earlier this month, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said Thursday.

The humanitarian aid is expected to arrive in the Central American nation by August, according to the foreign ministry.

On Wednesday, a ceremonial event attended by Vice Foreign Minister Jose Maria Liu (劉德立) and Guatemalan Ambassador to Taiwan Olga María Aguja was held in Taoyuan to mark the donation, with rice loaded onto a container destined for Guatemala.    [FULL  STORY]