Taiwan News
Date: 2016-02-18
By: Chia Lee, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

Taipei City is now able to strengthen each link in the chain of survival due to a more comprehensive medical care system since the EMSS integrated into it, the TCFD added. According to the TCFD’s statistics, the EMSS had helped save 102 lives last year.

Taipei City’s Emergency Medical Services System (EMSS) last year helped save more than a hundred lives. The city government on Thursday held an award ceremony to express gratitude toward those medical service providers who had contributed to the operation of the EMSS, and celebrate those patients who have been given a second chance of life.

Taipei City Fire Department (TCFD) established regionalized EMSS in five administration offices in Taipei since 2011, in order to implement the bypass principle and deliver injured persons to hospitals in time, according to city government.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan Today
Date: February 18, 2016

The recent magnitude 6.4 earthquake that struck Tainan City highlights the

The magnitude 6.4 earthquake that hit Tainan City focuses attention on the need for regular inspections of older Taiwan buildings. (CNA)

need for regular housing inspections and enhanced building safety standards so as to minimize loss of life and property damage from future temblors.

“The importance of housing inspections is underscored by the fact that 114 of the 116 quake victims died in a collapsed apartment complex,” said Su Yu-te, a spokesman from New Taipei City Architects Association.

According to Su, initial evidence revealed “deadly” flaws in the building. “The government must heighten public awareness in this regard and enforce stricter building codes,” he said.

“Many lives could have been saved had these problems been identified during regular inspections and a program of rectifications carried out.”     [FULL STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/02/18
By: Elaine Hou

Taipei, Feb. 18 (CNA) A Facebook post by Kin Moy, director of the American

from AIT Facebook page

Institute in Taiwan (AIT), on his participation in the annual Pingxi Sky Lantern Festival in northern Taiwan has drawn mixed comments, some of which criticized the sky lantern tradition as environmentally unfriendly.

Moy, who took up the AIT post last June, attended the Pingxi Lantern Festival Monday with his family and posted pictures and a comment on the AIT’s Facebook page about the experience.

“As you can see, it was wet,” he wrote. “But that didn’t dampen our enthusiasm for scrawling down our hopes and dreams for the new year and releasing them into the gentle rain.”

One of the accompanying photos showed Moy standing next to his wife and children, who were holding a sky lantern.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/02/17
By: Kuo Chu-chen and Elizabeth Hsu

Taipei, Feb. 17 (CNA) A Canadian man was arrested Wednesday after police raided his home in Pingtung County and found dozens of marijuana plants under cultivation there, the Pingtung County Police Bureau said.

The 37-year-old man also had equipment to make marijuana cigarettes, some of which were also found during the raid, police said.

The total value of the marijuana products found at the man’s home in southern Taiwan was around NT$640,000 (US$19,230), according to police.

The raid was carried out based on an investigation following a tip-off about two months ago that the unemployed man was running a marijuana business from his rented home in Neipu Township, police said.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/02/17
By: Tai Ya-chen and Bear Lee

Taipei, Feb. 17 (CNA) The Republic of China will not accept an imminent ruling on the sovereignty disputes in the South China Sea by The Hague-based Permanent Court of Arbitration, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Wednesday.

The ministry was responding to a call by U.S. President Barack Obama a day earlier that claimants to the disputed islands in the region should seek solutions through legal means and respect international law.

“Any disputes between claimants must be resolved peacefully through legal means such as the upcoming arbitration ruling under the U.N. Convention of the Law of the Seas, which the parties are obligated to respect and abide by,” Obama said at a press conference held at the end of a meeting between the U.S. and members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in California.

“The Republic of China cannot accept the ruling,” since Taiwan was not invited to take part in the arbitration process, nor did the court solicit its opinions during the hearings, said the ministry.     [FULL  STORY]

‘HUMILIATING’:Lee Teng-hui writing that the islands do not belong to Taiwan constitutes forfeiting sovereignty, the office said, while calling on Tsai to clarify her stance

Taipei Times
Date: Feb 18, 2016
By: Stacy Hsu / Staff reporter

The Presidential Office yesterday rebutted former president Lee Teng-hui’s (李登輝) argument that the disputed Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台) do not belong to Taiwan, saying it is an unquestionable fact that the Republic of China (ROC) holds sovereignty over the archipelago.

“Any remarks denying our sovereignty over the Diaoyutai Islands constitute an act of humiliating the nation and forfeiting its sovereignty. They will not be accepted by the ROC government, nor its people,” Presidential Office spokesman Charles Chen (陳以信) said.

Chen said it has been the government’s consistent stance that the Diaoyutai Islands have been an inherent part of the ROC since 1683.     [FULL  STORY]

The National
Date: February 17, 2016

TAIPEI/WASHINGTON // China has deployed an advanced surface-to-air

An aerial view of construction at Mabini (Johnson) Reef by China, in the disputed Spratly Islands. China has reportedly deployed two batteries of surface-to-air missile launchers to Woody Island in the island chain in the South China Sea, according to satellite imagery from ImageSat International. Armed Forces of the Philippines / EPA

missile system to one of the disputed islands it controls in the South China Sea, Taiwan and US officials said, ratcheting up tensions even as US president Barack Obama urged restraint in the region.

Major General David Lo, the Taiwan defence ministry spokesman, said on Wednesday the missile batteries had been set up on Woody Island. The island is part of the Paracels chain, under Chinese control for more than 40 years but also claimed by Taiwan and Vietnam.

A US defence official also confirmed the “apparent deployment” of the missiles, first reported by Fox News.

China’s foreign minister said the reports were created by “certain Western media” that should focus more on China’s building of lighthouses to improve shipping safety in the region.

“As for the limited and necessary self-defence facilities that China has built on islands and reefs we have people stationed on, this is consistent with the right to self-protection that China is entitled to under international law so there should be no question about it,” Wang Yi told reporters in Beijing.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan News
Date: 2016-02-17
By: George Liao, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense (MND) will pay close attention to developments of China’s missile deployment on one of the contested islands in the South China Sea, a defense ministry official said on Wednesday.

In an exclusive report, Fox News cited the imagery from ImageSat International (ISI) to show two batteries of eight surface-to-air missile launchers as well as a radar system have been deployed on Woody Island, part of the Paracel Island chain in the South China Sea. Woody Island is also claimed by Taiwan and Vietnam.

A U.S. official confirmed the accuracy of the photos, saying the imagery appears to show the HQ-9 air defense system, which has a range of 125 miles.

In view of China’s continuous military deployment in the South China Sea, MND spokesperson David Lo said all claimants should jointly maintain peace in the region and avoid taking unilateral actions to ramp up tensions     [FULL  STORY].