REVENGE ATTACK?A 48-year-old temple master, who was distributing rice at a temple charity event, is thought to have been the target of a revenge attack by gangsters

Taipei Times
Date: Sep 21, 2017
By: Jason Pan / Staff reporter

One man was killed and another critically injured yesterday in a suspected gang-

related shooting at a temple charity event in New Taipei City’s Tucheng District (土城).

A 20-year-old male suspect named Chen Chih-lun (陳致綸) turned himself in at the Tucheng Police Precinct yesterday afternoon, police said.

Authorities said six people were sent to a local hospital.

Shun Tien Fu Temple (巡天府) temple master Lin Li-chang (林立昌), 48, and temple volunteer Lai Kuo-ho (賴國和), 60, were reportedly in a critical condition.

Lin was to undergo emergency surgery last night.

Lai died of his injuries at hospital.    [FULL  STORY]

The China Post
Date: September 20, 2017
By: The China Post

A lone gunman opened fire during a charity event held by a temple in New Taipei City

Wednesday, killing one and injuring 5 including the temple’s chief and nephew of former lawmaker Lin Kuo-ching.

The former lawmaker, who was also at the scene, described the attack as an execution.

The shooting took place at around 1 p.m. in the city’s Tucheng District when the temple was handing out rice and food to the public. The suspected gunman, the 20-year-old Chen Chi-lun, fired multiple times at Lin Li-tseng, the ex-lawmaker’s nephew and the temple chief, from behind. According to the hospital that treated Lin, he was shot six times, including one in the back of his head from a short range. Lin lost all his vital signs when he was rushed to the hospital but his condition had stablized. A volunteer at the event, a sixty-year-old man named Lai Kuo-he, was hit by a bullet in the back and later died from his wounds.    [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 2017-09-19

Experts are considering how to fix a problem with the camera of Formosat-5,

Taiwan’s first domestically built satellite.

The satellite was launched in August, but the problem was not discovered until the satellite sent back its first batch of images on September 7. The images were blurry with bright spots in places, an issue believed to be the result of focus length offset.

The National Applied Research Laboratories held a press conference Tuesday confirming the problem. They have proposed fixing the problem by changing the satellite’s internal temperature, changing its orbital distance from the Earth, and correcting photos with software based on images taken by another satellite.    [FULL  STORY]

A set of mahjong has been placed at a tree burial site for three deceased members of a family so that they can continue playing the Chinese game in another world.

Taiwan News
Date: 2017/09/19
By: George Liao, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News)—A Taiwanese woman has placed a mahjong set at a tree

burial site for three deceased family members in the hopes that they can continue playing the Chinese game and have good times in another world, according to a natural burial park staffer in central Taiwan.

The burial spot looks very different from other graves in the natural burial park as there is a set of mahjong encircling the spot, while others only have plants on them. The natural burial park is located within the fifth public cemetery of Puxin Township, Changhua County.

A park staffer surnamed Chu said they usually call those buried in the park “tenants” and their burial spots their “homes.”

The home decorated with the mahjong set has three tenants, who were parents and brother of a woman surnamed Hu, Chu said, adding that the woman moved her three deceased family members from other cemeteries in Hemei Township to the natural burial park in Puxin. Hu’s brother and parents had a close relationship when they were alive and often played mahjong together, and therefore she bought a set of mahjong to decorate the home, hoping they could still have great times playing the game together in another world, according to Chu.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2017/09/19
By: Wang Shwu-fen, Chen Chi-fong and Elizabeth Hsu

Kaohsiung, Sept. 19 (CNA) The Kaohsiung Water Resources Bureau has angered

local people by demolishing a 90-year-old Japanese-style wooden police dormitory without first assessing the property’s cultural value.

The bureau, which was blasted for not respecting cultural heritage, was accused Tuesday of “sneakily” demolishing the old dorm — located close to the Kaohsiung City Police Department’s Cishan Precinct — the history of which is described in a tourism promotion brochure written by local history and culture groups.

Wang Chi-wei (王繼維), a member of local rock band Youth Banana, criticized the bureau’s action as “sneaky” and a violation of the Cultural Heritage Preservation Act.
[FULL  STORY]

FUZZY:The agency acknowledged problems with Formosat-5’s camera, resulting in blurry images, but denied it was caused by any defect in the satellite’s CMOS

Taipei Times
Date: Sep 20, 2017
By: Lin Chia-nan / Staff reporter

Following a media report saying Formosat-5 was transmitting fuzzy images, National

Space Organization (NSPO) officials yesterday said they are recalibrating the satellite’s camera, but denied that it had experienced a system failure.

Formosat-5, the nation’s first domestically developed satellite, which cost about NT$5.65 billion (US$187.5 million), was launched on Aug. 25 from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. It was scheduled to start sending images to the NSPO by Sept. 8.

A report published yesterday by the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) said the imaging capability of Formosat-5 might be compromised after the first set of images it sent back on Sept. 7 were blurry, with some showing stripes and light spots.

The report also said the agency had detected the problem before the satellite’s launch, but failed to calibrate its CMOS chips.    [FULL  STORY]

The China Post
Date: September 19, 2017
By: The China Post

Lai Xiang-jun went to great lengths to organize her elementary class reunion. But in

addition to seeing her long-lost classmates, there is another reason why Lai tried so hard.

According to the Chinese-language daily Liberty Times, Lai, now a senior high school teacher, teamed up with former classmate Chen Fong-chi in tracking down their elementary schoolmates, most of whom they haven’t been talking to in 33 years. Even with the help of their class teacher, Lai and Chen did not go far.

That’s when they turned to the registration office in Taichung’s Longjing District for help. The office did not give the duo the contact information of the classmates for privacy reasons but agreed to notify them of Lai’s invitation. In the end, the office contacted 45 in total, 30 of them showed up at the reunion held on Aug. 22.

There was one of them, a woman surnamed Hsu, Lai and many other classmates wanted to see most. Hsu was the target of bullying by many in the class in grade 5 and grade 6. The boys called her “ET” and would to trip her, trick her and kick her schoolbag. The girls were too scared to stand up for her.    [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 2017-09-18

Taiwan’s Presidential Office says it’s the president, not the party, who has the right to

decide on whether to pardon former President Chen Shui-bian.

After leaving office in 2008, Chen was sentenced to 20 years in prison on corruption charges and is now on medical parole. Both he and the current president, Tsai Ing-wen, have roots in the ruling party — the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

An alliance of city councilors who are fighting to free Chen said that 85% of their members have signed a petition calling for Chen’s pardon. The alliance collected 505 signatures of DPP representatives. Of the 68 DPP lawmakers in the nation’s legislature, 48 have signed the petition. But Presidential Office spokesperson Alex Huang clarified the president’s stance on the case.

“The ruling party is not ruling for the party’s sake alone. We can understand what people have been expressing due to their emotions but we also believe everyone will respect the president’s right based on the constitution,” said Huang. “This is our basic stance on this issue.”    [FULL  STORY]

Simple lifestyle changes such as eating right, being physically active, drinking less and avoiding tobacco can prevent six out of every 10 cancer cases

Taiwan News
Date: 2017/09/18
By: Jose Kalathil, Taiwan News, Contributing Writer

NEW DELHI (Taiwan News) — Simple lifestyle changes such as eating right, being

physically active, drinking less and avoiding tobacco can prevent six out of every 10 cancer cases.

Speaking at an event organized by the Indian Cancer Society (ICS), Dr A K Dewan, director of Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute, said, “Earlier, we didn’t know the cause of many cancers. So, it was referred as ‘bad luck’ or ‘fate.’ That’s not correct.”

Heavy drinking, for example, has a role to play in cancer of liver while smoking is a known cause for lung and oral cancer cases, he said. “Only 5% of all cancer cases are hereditary and another 15-20% are familial or environment-related,” he added.
[FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2017/09/18
By: Sophia Yeh and Evelyn Kao

Taipei, Sept. 18 (CNA) President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said Monday during a meeting

with a Taiwan-based Muslim association that the Muslim community is a major partner of Taiwan and an indispensable force for promoting its New Southbound Policy.

At the beginning of the meeting, Tsai congratulated the delegation composed of members of the Taipei-based Chinese Muslim Association for concluding its Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca, the most holy city for Muslims.

The association organizes an annual Hajj mission and sponsors an international Islamic conference, an Asia regional Muslim youth summer camp and Islamic study courses.    [FULL  STORY]