Taiwan News
Date: 2016-03-28
By: George Liao, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

The suspect who decapitated a four-year-old girl on Monday morning said during initial questioning that he doesn’t know the victim and her family members.

The suspect, who is 33 and surnamed Wang, randomly attacked a toddler from behind with a Chinese chopper sometime after 11 AM when the victim, surnamed Liu, was resting during a bike trip with her mother and grandfather near Xihu Taipei Municipal Elementary School in Taipei’s Neihu District. The victim, whose head was severed from her body, died instantly.

Wang was arrested on the spot and the initial investigation revealed that Wang has medical records at a city hospital as well as records of prior drug abuse. Wang is jobless.

The Songde Branch of the Taipei City Hospital later confirmed that the suspect had sought treatment there once in 2014, but added that it does not prove he has a mental illness, according to the state media Central News Agency.

The grieving mother said during a media interview that she had never thought that the society could be so unsafe and that she hoped that the government would do something. “The suspect was insane at the time of committing the crime,” the mother said.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/03/28
By: Christie Chen, Yiu Kai-hsiang, Liu Chien-pan, and Hsieh Chia-chen

Taipei, March 28 (CNA) Struggling to hold back her tears, the heartbroken mother of a child slain in a random attack in Taipei on Monday said she never imagined society was so unsafe and urged the government to take action so that people like the suspect will no longer exist.

Speaking to the media, the mother of the 4-year-old girl who was decapitated by a 33-year-old man said her daughter was riding a strider bike about a meter away from her when the bike got stuck and could not make its way onto the sidewalk.

When the suspect approached her daughter, she thought he was going to help her pick up her bike, but instead he began attacking her, the mother said.

“I saw the suspect slashing my daughter with a cleaver. I immediately grabbed him but I could not pull him away,” she said, adding that she screamed for help and passersby and nearby residents rushed to subdue the suspect.     [FULL  STORY]

Breaking news …

Eye On Taiwan
March 28, 2016
By: Eye On Taiwan Staff

In Taipei’s Neihu District this morning a 4-year old girl was beheaded on a public street while

riding her bicycle reportedly a random attack. The girl was with her mother who was pushing a baby carriage which contained her baby sibling.  They were on their way to a local metro station in northern Taipei’s Neihu District.

Local TV showed the decapitated body covered in a white cloth on the sidewalk near the child’s bicycle.The killer used a kitchen knife and was unknown to the family.

The suspect allegedly first stabbed the little girl in the neck with the knife and then came

back at her with a saw and beheaded her.  The blood stained kitchen knife has been found at the scene.

The suspect, said to be in his forties, who is being detained by Police, has yet to be identified.

This comes as a great shock to the Taiwan public since violent crimes such as this are extremely rare in Taiwan.

We will provide more information when it becomes available.   [SOURCE]

Photos by the Apple Daily News

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/03/28
By: Yiu Kai-hsiang and Jay Chen

Taipei, March 28 (CNA) A 3-year-old girl was decapitated in an apparent random attack in

Taipei Monday in full view of her mother, police said.

A man said to be in his forties has been detained in connection to the gruesome killing.

The attack occurred late Monday morning when the girl, whose name has not been revealed, and her mother were on their way to a local metro station in northern Taipei’s Neihu District.

Local TV footage showed the decapitated body covered in white cloth on a sidewalk near the child’s strider bike.

A bloodstained kitchen knife was found near the crime scene.      [SOURCE]

Taiwan News
Date: 2016-03-27
By: George Liao, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

Most of the nearly 7,000 residents of the Sanwei region in Kaohsiung City’s Linyuan District have expressed their hope that the government would relocate CPC Corp’s local petrochemical plant or relocate the village after having suffered pollutions from the plant for more than 30 years.

A man with the local name of “A Fa,” who is over 70 years old and has been living in Sanwei since he was a small boy, said that he could not live without taking daily medicine for chronicle ailments caused by the air pollution. He said that he felt alone because many of his old friends have died of cancer, adding that he hoped the plant would stop harming the residents’ health by stopping emitting toxic gases.

The third and fourth naphtha cracker (NC) plants of CPC’s Linyuan Petrochemical Plant t have been established since 1979 and 1983 respectively.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/03/27
By: Sunrise Huang and Christie Chen

Taipei, March 27 (CNA) Efforts restarted Sunday to remove oil and fuel from a container ship that ran aground off Taiwan’s northern coast over two weeks ago.

As the weather improved off the coast on Sunday, workers were able to set up oil pipes and extractors to pump out heavy oil and fuel from the “T.S. Taipei” (德翔台北) ship.

The pumping operation has been slow because there have only been six days when the sea was calm enough for the operation to proceed since the accident occurred on March 10 in waters off Shimen in New Taipei, and bad weather forced work crews to remove pipes.

Battered by rough seas, the stranded vessel began breaking apart on March 24, leaking substantial amounts of oil into the sea, creating a heavily polluted area within a 500-meter radius of the ship and a slick that can reach as far as five kilometers away.     [FULL  STORY]