Focus Taiwan
Date: 07/28/2020
By: Wu Hsin-yun and Matthew Mazzetta

Taipei, July 28 (CNA) The Council of Agriculture (COA) issued a warning Tuesday after a Taiwanese woman allegedly received a package containing soil from an unknown sender in China, echoing several similar incidents that have been reported in the United States in recent days.

Taiwanese Facebook user Lin Wen-wen (林文雯) wrote in a widely-shared Facebook post Sunday that in early July she received an international parcel containing what was listed as a sample of potting soil from two unknown senders in Shanghai's Qingpu District.

After the delivery service and the 165 anti-fraud hotline were unable to answer her questions about the package, Lin said she contacted the COA's Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine (BAPHIQ), which asked her to bring it to its Taipei Songshan Airport Inspection Station for testing.

On Tuesday, Chen Tzu-wei (陳子偉), head of the bureau's plant quarantine section, confirmed to CNA that his office had received the package, which he said appeared to be nothing more than a soil mixture.    [FULL  STORY]

THAI CASE UPDATE: Twenty-nine close contacts of the worker have been tested with two types of tests, including 18 dorm mates, with 28 negative results so far

Taipei Times
Date: Jul 29, 2020
By: Lee I-chia / Staff reporter

Five imported cases of COVID-19, four from the Philippines and one from Hong Kong, were reported yesterday, bringing the total confirmed cases in Taiwan to 467, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said yesterday.

The four returning from the Philippines were on the same flight, and the local health department has identified 15 people who had direct contact with them — including 10 passengers in the two rows in front or behind them, who have been put under 14-day home isolation, and five crew members, who will practice 14-day self-health management, said Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥), the CECC spokesperson.

The same applies to the 12 passengers who sat in the two rows in front or behind the person returning from Hong Kong and crew members on that flight, he said.

As for the case of a Thai migrant worker in Bangkok who tested positive for COVID-19 after returning from Taiwan on Tuesday last week, Chuang said that 29 close contacts have been identified, including 18 who lived in the same dormitory — who have been placed in mandatory isolation — and 11 colleagues, who have been asked to practice self-health management.
[FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 27 July, 2020
By: Leslie Liao

Taiwan’s Central Epidemic Command Center confirmed four new imported cases of COVID-19 on Monday, bringing the country’s total to 462. 

One of the cases is a woman in her 20’s who worked in the African nation of Lesotho before returning to Taiwan on July 25. Health authorities are monitoring eight people who have come into contact with the woman.     [FULL  STORY]

Global Times
Date: 2020/7/28
By: Huang Lanlan

The Taiwan regional authority's move to bar entry for children of mainland-Taiwan couples amid the COVID-19 pandemic is causing anger among the public due to its obvious politicization of the virus and discrimination against mainland residents. Many mainland-Taiwan families who have been separated from their loved ones across the Straits have condemned the separatist Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) authority for utilizing these children as a tool for political purposes, urging it to let them go back to the island and reunite with their parents soon.

Ye, a mother who has been separated from her 18-year-old son since the virus outbreak, has made lots of petitions to Taiwan authorities in these months. She and some other parents even kneeled at the gate of the local health department and called for cancellation of the entry ban, only to get no response.

"I never thought there would be a day I would kneel down to others only for family reunion," Ye told the Global Times. Months of separation have made this brokenhearted mother extremely worried and sleepless, having to take drugs for treating anxiety disorders. "Being ripped apart from my child is a big pain to me," she said.

Taiwan's entry ban came out in late January before the Ye family was about to head for Taiwan after spending the Chinese New Year (CNY) vacation in Ye's hometown, East China's Fujian Province. Ye and her husband had to go back to the island for work, leaving their son alone in Fujian with no friends and few relatives.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwanese cookery writer bombarded by Chinese insults as US shuts down consulate in Chengdu

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/07/27
By: Ching-Tse Cheng, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwanese cookery writer and wife of U.S. Consul General Jim Mullinax, Chuang Tzu-I (莊祖宜), has received thousands of hostile comments from Chinese netizens following the closure of the American consulate in Chengdu.

In contrast to the relatively calm atmosphere outside of the U.S. consulate in Chengdu on Sunday (July 26), netizens on Chinese social media platform Weibo have been actively launching attacks against U.S. government officials and their family members. Chuang, who has raised two children with Mullinax and has nearly 600,000 followers on the network, was especially targeted for comparing her departure from the Chinese city of Chengdu in February to Jews fleeing the Nazis during World War II.

Some Weibo users referred to Chuang and Mullinax as spies and Taiwan independence activists, adding that they were not Jews and that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) shared no resemblance to the Nazis. Meanwhile, her complaint about her husband not being able to return home due to the coronavirus pandemic has also enraged Chinese netizens who accused her of exaggerating the situation for pity.

A few Chinese netizens mocked Chuang for being in the U.S., where they said the pandemic situation is the worst in the world. They also told her to get ready for the endless "racist attacks" by Americans, reported Liberty Times.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 07/27/2020
By: Yeh Kuan-ying and Elizabeth Hsu

Taipei, July 27 (CNA) Three top executives at Taiwan's independent Public Television Service (PTS) resigned after the station's board approved a plan Monday to prepare for the setting up of a controversial international programming platform in English.

PTS President Tsao Wen-chieh (曹文傑), Executive Vice President Hsieh Tsui-yu (謝翠玉) and news department manager Su Chi-chen (蘇啟禎) tendered their resignations after the project was approved by an 11-4 vote. None of the three are members of the board.

The Ministry of Culture (MOC) announced a plan earlier this month for an "International Digital Communication Program" that would create an English-language programming platform to offer shows that "introduce Taiwan to the world."

At Monday's meeting, PTS board members were asked to decide whether to approve a plan to make preparations for the program.    [FULL  STORY]

CONTACT TRACING: The man had worked in northern Taiwan since January 2018, returned home on a China Airlines flight on Tuesday and tested positive on Saturday

Taipei Times
Date: Jul 28, 2020
By: Lee I-chia / Staff reporter

The possibility of a locally acquired infection cannot yet be ruled out in the case a Thai man who tested positive for COVID-19 after returning home from Taiwan last week, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said yesterday.

The migrant worker, who returned to Thailand on Tuesday, tested positive for COVID-19 on Saturday at a quarantine center in Bangkok, and was one of four new cases that Thailand’s Centre for COVID-19 Situation Administration reported yesterday.

Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥), the CECC spokesperson, said the man, who had worked in northern Taiwan since Jan. 17, 2018, flew home on China Airlines (中華航空) Flight CI-831.

The Bangkok Post reported that Thailand has classified the man’s case as an imported one, but the CECC still wants to confirm with Thai authorities when he became symptomatic, as it only found about him at noon, Chuang said.    [FULL  STORY]

The US had, earlier this month, deployed two of its frontline aircraft carriers and their strike groups comprising more battleships, in the South China Sea besides flying reconnaissance aircraft in the region.

Hindustani Times
Date: Jul 26, 2020
By: Sutirtho Patranobis
Edited by: Sparshita Saxena

China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has begun a well-publicised live-fire drill in the southern Guangdong province’s Leizhou Peninsula, considered to be the doorstep of the South China Sea (SCS), official media reported on Sunday.

The week-long drills, which will include anti-ship and anti-aircraft exercises by the PLA air force with the PLA’s navy and rocket forces joining in, are being held in the backdrop of rising tension with the US over, among other issues, the SCS disputes and Washington’s sale of arms to Taiwan.

Last week, for the first time, Washington rejected China’s maritime claims in the SCS, large parts of which are also claimed by Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, and Taiwan.

Also read: China tried to jab India with a new claim on Bhutan. Why it has boomeranged

The messaging behind the PLA’s latest drill is directed at the US, which had also, earlier this month, deployed two of its frontline aircraft carriers and their strike groups comprising more battleships, in the SCS besides flying reconnaissance aircraft in the region.   [FULL  STORY]

INQUIRER.net
Date: July 26, 2020

Police utilized the in-game mailing system in “Animal Crossing: New Horizons” to find the owner of a lost Nintendo Switch in Taipei, Taiwan.

The man ended up leaving the gaming console on top of an ATM while he was withdrawing money, as per the gaming site Game Rant last Sunday, July 19.

Moments later, another person spotted the gadget on the machine and gave it to the local police. However, the device had no information about its owner, which prompted one officer to think outside the box.

The said policeman eventually decided to log in to the copy of “Animal Crossing: New Horizons” installed in the device to track down the owner, as per report. The department then wrote a letter to one of the user’s in-game friends, stating that they found the lost gadget, and sent that letter using the program’s mailing system.    [FULL  STORY]

39-year-old Xiao Hui cannot speak, does not carry cell phone, last seen on route of Fengyuan Bus Transportation Bus 55

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/07/26
By: George Liao, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The aging parents of a mentally disabled woman named Xiao Hui (小慧) have been searching for their missing daughter under the scorching sun since Friday (July 24), when she went missing after getting off a bus at the wrong stop.

Xiao Hui, 39, cannot speak, has no cellphone, and is only carrying a contact book for the city's association of parents with mentally disabled children (台中市智障者家長協會), per CNA. After Xiao Hui left the association, she took Fengyuan Bus Transportation Bus 55, but as there are no records of her disembarking, it has proved difficult to locate her.

Despite the heat, Xiao Hui's parents, both in their 70s, have been looking for their daughter along the route. They have been unable to sleep for two days and have reportedly both lost their voice due to continually calling out to their daughter.

Police have so far failed to located any relevant surveillance footage.   [FULL  STORY]