Increasing workplace inspections had some predictable yet sobering results.

The News Lens
Date: 2018/01/20
By: If Lin

The Labor Standards Act has been in a state of flux since early 2017, and it seems that

the drama is not over yet. The latest round of amendments have been hit with a simmering backlash, the New Power Party and Social Democratic Party are trying to build support for a referendum on the changes, and the Presidential Office Human Rights Consultative Committee has called for an investigation into human rights violations caused by the law, which was sold as a way to increase flexibility for businesses and employees.

Just because a law is in place doesn’t mean that businesses are following them. One newly-created database highlights 29,360 violations between August 2011 and December 2017, most of which occurred after 2014 when the Occupational Safety and Health Act was enacted. That act mandated more widespread government inspections of workplaces, leading to a precipitous rise in recorded violations.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan News  
Date: 2018/01/20
By:  Central News Agency

Taipei, Jan. 20 (CNA) Over 11,000 chickens and ducks have been culled on two farms

in Pingtung and Changhua counties after it was confirmed that they had been infected with the highly pathogenic H5N2 strain of avian influenza, inspection officials said Saturday.
A total of 10,450 chickens on a farm in Pingtung’s Neipu Township and 1,362 ducks on a farm in Changhua’s Erlin Township were culled, according to the Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine.

That brings the total number of poultry farms hit by avian influenza to 12 so far this year, and the total number of birds culled to 115,055, the bureau said.  [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/01/20
By: Liu Chien-pang and Kuan-lin Liu

Taipei, Jan. 20 (CNA) Two tankers registered through the Billions Bunker Group, the

corporation accused of selling oil to North Korea, were denied entry into Kaohsiung Port in southern Taiwan Friday.

The tankers — the Kings Way and the Twins Bull — are named on Taiwan’s no entry list and watch list due to alleged violations of United Nations sanctions, Yao Chou-tien (姚洲典), head of the Coast Guard Administration’s (CGA) Department of Coastal Control, said in an interview Saturday.

A coast guard team requested to search the Twins Bull, boarding it at around 6:40 p.m. to find a crew of 14, including an Indonesian captain, but no oil or any other prohibited cargo was discovered, he said.    [FULL  STORY]

‘SAFETY FIRST’: It is the shared responsibility of the governments on both sides of the Taiwan Strait to ensure the safe return of Taiwanese businesspeople, the MAC said

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 21, 2018
By: Stacy Hsu  /  Staff reporter

China-based Taiwanese businesspeople “understood” the rationale behind possible

cancelations of additional flights during the Lunar New Year holiday in response to Beijing’s unilateral activation of four aviation routes over the Taiwan Strait, the semi-official Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) said yesterday.

The foundation said in a statement that it on Thursday contacted associations of China-based Taiwanese businesspeople in eight points of departure, including Shanghai, Nanjing and Fuzhou, who could be affected by the policy to gauge their needs and possible concerns.

The foundation told the associations’ leaders that the approval of additional flights has been stalled due to concerns over aviation safety caused by Beijing on Jan. 4 disregarding a 2015 cross-strait agreement and activating the northbound M503 route and extending routes W121, W122 and W123.    [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 2018-01-19

President Tsai Ing-wen says Taiwan’s universities should be more flexible to meet the

needs of a changing society. The president was speaking Friday at an annual national meeting of the heads of the country’s higher education institutions.

“[We] should not open courses just so schools have students to teach. Classes should be organized to train students to meet society’s needs. Classes should be based not on what the teacher has to teach but on what the students need as they enter society,” Tsai said.

Tsai said the quality of a country’s higher education is closely linked to its competitiveness. She said the higher education system should find ways to be more flexible, for instance to allow students to enter the workforce and then return to school for further education and training.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan is spinning pirouettes while the rest of the region plods towards authoritarianism, according to a Freedom House report.

The News Lens
Date: 2018/01/19
By: Stellina Chen

American nongovernmental organization Freedom House this week released its “Freedom in the World 2018” report, suggesting Taiwan has extended its position at the head of the Sinosphere when it comes to basic freedoms.

But hey, it’s not hard to take the day when the rest of the region is teetering on the brink of disaster.

Individual country profiles have not yet been released by Freedom House, but it’s not hard to see why Taiwan deserves its reputation as an unfettered land of liberty and justice. Taiwan’s Supreme Court has decreed that marriage equality must eventually be enshrined in law, people show up for protests even in heavy rain and Reporters Without Borders has even moved their Asian bureau here.    [FULL  STORY]

Suspect traveled on high speed train to Tainan with submachine gun

Taiwan News 
Date: 2018/01/19
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – Police arrested a man leaving the Tainan High Speed Rail

Station with a gun in his bag as a suspect in a shooting incident near a Taipei shopping mall earlier Friday.

Nobody was injured in the incident, but the man had reportedly been seen firing a gun three times in the air near the Taipei New Horizon shopping center (台北松菸文創) around 1 p.m.

The building houses a hotel, an Eslite bookstore and numerous boutiques, but police suspected the show of force was directed at the offices of a construction company part of the Fubon Group.

Police found evidence that a man had arrived by taxi, fired three shots in the air, and left again, the Central News Agency reported. He apparently took the cab to the high speed rail station in Taoyuan, where he boarded a train with a ticket to Tainan.
[FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/01/19
By: Yeh Su-ping and Ko Lin

Taipei, Jan. 19 (CNA) Taiwan is calling for discussions with Beijing on aviation issues

related to its recent unilateral decision to launch a northbound M503 route, Presidential Office spokesman Sidney Lin (林鶴明) said Friday.

President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) has condemned the move, reiterating that Beijing’s unilateral announcement has not only affected aviation safety but also hurt the stability of the region, Lin said.

The president is urging China to start negotiations with Taiwan as soon as possible, in line with an agreement reached by the two sides in 2015, he said.

Beijing was criticized internationally when it first unveiled the M503 southbound route in 2015, and it further angered Taiwan on Jan. 4, 2018 when it unilaterally announced the launch of the M503 northbound route without consulting Taiwan.    [FULL  STORY]

PROPER TREATMENT: The European Parliament called on China to ensure adequate medical care and regular, unrestricted visits by relatives and lawyers for detainees

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 20, 2018
By: Staff writer, with CNA, BRUSSELS

The European Parliament on Thursday passed a resolution calling for the Chinese

government to drop the charges against several human rights activists, including Taiwanese Lee Ming-che (李明哲), and for them to be released.

It was the second time that it has called for Lee’s release. The first was in July last year after he had been detained in China for more than three months for alleged “subversion of state power.”

Since then, Lee has been convicted and sentenced to five years in prison and the deprivation of his political rights for two years.

In Thursday’s resolution, the European Parliament also addressed the cases of Chinese activists Wu Gan (吳淦) and Xie Yang (謝陽), as well as Tibetan activist Tashi Wangchuk and Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, who the Dalai Lama has named as the 11th Panchen Lama.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan still has many night markets, unlike the mainland and Singapore where they have all but vanished

Post Magazine
Date: 18 Jan 2018
By: Wee Kek Koon

I’ve visited Taiwan many times and I’ve always liked the place. The short flight from

Hong Kong makes it ideal for a weekend jaunt, during which you can get good food at reasonable prices, meet friendly people speaking with gentle, lilting accents, and, of course, visit the National Palace Museum, in Taipei.

Then there are the island’s many night markets, though some may be of the opinion that if you’ve seen one you’ve seen them all. There’s some truth to that, but my partiality towards Taiwan’s night markets stems from my nostalgia for the pasar malam.

As a child in Singapore, going to a neighbourhood pasar malam (“night market” in Malay) was a treat, but now they have all but vanished, appearing only on festive or special occasions, with neat rows of stalls that are subjected to stringent health and hygiene stand­ards, which is no bad thing, I suppose.    [FULL  STORY]