Taipei Times
Date:  Dec 12, 2015

Recently there have been a succession of thefts of outer garment from

department stores in Taipei’s Xinyi District, including one outer garment of high-end brand name worth almost NT$50,000. Police consulted CCTV footage and homed in on a 36-year-old male, surnamed Chiu, as being implicated in the cases. When police headed to Chiu’s house to find him, he was not at home. Little could they have imagined that a person who was seen pacing up and down outside the police station in a suspicious manner in the middle of the night later that very day would, following questioning, turn out to be none other than Chiu.

Chiu said that when he found out that the police had come knocking on his door, he became worried that his family would discover that he had been stealing things, and that was why he decided to go to the police of his own accord and turn himself in.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/12/10
By: Wu Jhe-hao and Evelyn Kao

Taipei, Dec. 10 (CNA) Taiwan’s Changhua District Prosecutors Office on Thursday filed an appeal over a not-guilty verdict for Ting Hsin International Group (頂新集團), a major edible oil producer accused of using substandard ingredients in its oil products and violating the country’s food safety law.

In a ruling handed down last month, the Changhua District Court acquitted Ting Hsin Chairman Wei Ying-chung and six other defendants in the food safety scandal, sparking a widespread outcry in Taiwan.

Wei was indicted in October 2014 for allegedly violating the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation after investigators found that his company had imported animal feed-grade fat and declared it as fit for human consumption. It was then used to make cooking oil, prosecutors said.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan Today
Date: December 10, 2015

Taiwan climbed 10 places from last year to finish atop 121 countries and

territories in the latest Global Open Data Index published by U.K.-based Open Knowledge International.

With 78 percent of its government data assessed open, the nation’s performance is its best ever in the annual survey. It also makes Taiwan the first outside Europe to place in the top three.

Cabinet spokesman Sun Lih-chyun said this year’s result is particularly praiseworthy as the country finished ahead of the U.K., Denmark, Colombia and Finland in that order. “The rating represents a resounding vote of confidence in government measures and private sector efforts promoting open data over the past year.”     [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date:  Dec 11, 2015
By: Staff Writer, with CNA

Sunita Danuwar of Nepal yesterday won the Asia Democracy and Human

Rights Award, which was presented to her by the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy at a ceremony in Taipei, in recognition of her dedication to rescuing female victims of human trafficking.

Once a sex slave, Danuwar is now president of Shakti Samuha, a non-governmental organization in Nepal that provides shelter, legal aid, vocational training and counseling to survivors of human trafficking.

The award was presented to Danuwar by President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) at the ceremony on International Human Rights Day.

In an address at the ceremony, Ma praised Danuwar’s unrelenting efforts to rescue female victims of human trafficking, saying she has also helped raise awareness of the problem.

Danuwar has built a good reputation at home and abroad, going from a victim to an activist for women’s rights, Ma said.

The annual market value of human trafficking and child prostitution is estimated at tens of billions of US dollars, Ma said, adding that the efforts to combat the problem must continue.     [FULL  STORY]

The Examiner
Date: December 9, 2015

Aquia Tsay, chairman of the Free Taiwan Party, was assaulted on December 3, during a protest against the visit to Taiwan of Chen Deming from the Peoples’

Republic of China. Chen is director of the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits and was making a factory tour in Yilan County when his motorcade was confronted by fifty members of the Free Taiwan Party and a group of Falun Gong members. Republic of China in-exile police rushed the demonstrators, targeting Aquia, who fell to the ground during the assault. In the melee, a suspected PRC security agent kicked Aquia and grabbed at his neck.

Aquia told the news media that the objective of the protest was to let Chen hear the voice of Taiwanese that Taiwanese do not condone the ambition of China to annex Taiwan. The protesters had signs, proclaiming “Taiwan Independence” and “One Taiwan, One China, Two Countries on Opposite Sides of the Strait”. They also shouted “Chen Deh-min, go back to China!”     [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
December 10, 2015

About 600 members of the Nan Shan Life Insurance Co labor union yesterday launch a strike during a protest outside the company’s headquarters in Taipei, demanding raises and a higher annual bonus.