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KMT’s Hung Hsiu-chu still undecided on US visit

Want China Times
Date: 2015-08-19
By: CNA and Staff Reporter

The presidential candidate of Taiwan’s ruling Kuomintang, Hung Hsiu-chu, said Tuesday

Hung Hsiu-chu gives a press conference at KMT headquarters in Taipei, Aug. 18. (File photo/CNA)

Hung Hsiu-chu gives a press conference at KMT headquarters in Taipei, Aug. 18. (File photo/CNA)

she has not yet decided whether to visit the United States before January’s election, adding that she will only talk about the issue after September.

Hung made the remarks when asked about an invitation extended by Taiwanese expatriates in the United States for her to attend a campaign rally scheduled for Aug. 29 in San Jose, California.

Whether Hung will visit the United States has drawn media attention as she has previously expressed reluctance to do so, even to the extent of pouring scorn on her opposition Democratic Progressive Party rival Tsai Ing-wen, whose successful US visit in June was dismissed by Hung as being like an unnecessary “job interview” that she herself did not wish to undertake.

Her stance was somewhat moderated after it became clear that the KMT leadership wished her to go to the US.     [FULL  STORY]

Rallies held over ash in Kaohsiung

AIRBORNE ASH:Residents of Kaohsiung’s Siaogang District said that ash from a nearby iron ore storage site had blown into their homes and turned into an oily dust

Taipei Times
Date: , Aug 20, 2015
By: Chen Wei-han  /  Staff reporter

Environmental groups and residents of Kaohsiung’s Siaogang District (小港) yesterday

Smoke belches out of a chimney at an industrial complex in Kaohsiung in an undated photograph. Photo: Chang Chung-yi, Taipei Times

Smoke belches out of a chimney at an industrial complex in Kaohsiung in an undated photograph. Photo: Chang Chung-yi, Taipei Times

rallied in front of Kaohsiung City Hall to protest against the ash they said had blown into their community from a China Steel Corp iron ore storage site.

Dozens of protesters assembled in front of the city hall in the morning, holding placards and covering their hands with ash that they said had blown from the company’s Siaogang District outdoor iron ore storage site into their homes.

The protesters demanded that Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chu (陳菊) order the company to construct roofed storehouses to curb the ash leaking into the atmosphere, as Taichung Mayor Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) has done in his city.

In Taichung, following the passage of a city statute regulating the storage of coal, Taichung-based Dragon Steel Corp — a subsidiary of China Steel — recently announced a NT$9 billion (US$275.5 million) project to construct enclosed depositories to store its bituminous coal.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan’s Feeling of Isolation

Taiwan’s Feeling of Isolation

ANI News
Date:Aug 18, 2015

Recent footage from state broadcaster CCTV gained instant notoriety when it showed taiwanPeople’s Liberation Army (PLA) soldiers training at a base in Inner Mongolia. Why? Because images depicted a building in the scenario that looked remarkably similar to the Presidential Office Building in Taipei.

The “renegade province” of Taiwan remains China’s archenemy, but imagery of Chinese soldiers assaulting the structure in a July broadcast should rightly do more than just raise eyebrows.

Satellite imagery reveals that the PLA built the replica Taipei building at the southern end of the Zhurihe training base in 2014-15. Not only is the presidential building located there, but an accurate grid of streets is also represented. While the building is not an exact copy – that might be pushing political expediency just too far – it is remarkably similar.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan Villagers Still Cut Off More Than a Week After Typhoon Soudelor

weather.com
Date: 18 2015

It’s been more than a week since Typhoon Soudelor slammed into Taiwan and

More than a week after Typhoon Soudelor slammed into Taiwan, many residents are still without power and telephone, and getting supplies is very difficult due to the many areas where roads are washed away. (Credit: Tobie Openshaw)

More than a week after Typhoon Soudelor slammed into Taiwan, many residents are still without power and telephone, and getting supplies is very difficult due to the many areas where roads are washed away. (Credit: Tobie Openshaw)

southeastern China, but for some villages the impacts from the storm are far from over.

Remote mountain towns like Wulai, which suffered some of the storm’s worst damage, are still cut off from the rest of the country thanks to landslides that have blocked its only road access.

Roughly 2,000 of its 3,100 residents were evacuated before Soudelor made landfall, but about 1,100 stayed behind because they wanted to clean up what the storm left behind.

Four of its five famed hot-spring hotels were completely destroyed in the storm, dealing a crushing blow to Wulai’s tourism industry. The village is well-known for its hot springs that draw visitors from around the island.     [FULL  STORY]

Goni forecast to become super typhoon as it spins west toward Taiwan

The Washington Post
Date: August 17, 2015
By: Angela Fritz

Twin typhoons are spinning west across the Pacific Ocean — Goni and Atsani — poised

Typhoon Goni (left) and Typhoon Atsani (right) are forecast to reach super typhoon-status at the same time on Thursday. (JMA)

Typhoon Goni (left) and Typhoon Atsani (right) are forecast to reach super typhoon-status at the same time on Thursday. (JMA)

to become the sixth and seventh super typhoons of the 2015 season later this week.

The last time there were two super typhoons in the Pacific at the same time was in October 1997, when Super Typhoons Ivan and Joan overlapped. Not coincidentally, 1997 was also the strongest El Niño on record, with sea surface temperatures running far above average across the tropical Pacific Ocean. At the very least, this year’s El Niño could at least rival 1997’s intensity.

Typhoon Goni has been slowly tracking northwest through the Pacific Ocean since Thursday when it formed as a tropical depression. Since then it tracked through the Northern Mariana islands, missing Guam to the south and Saipan to the north. Anderson Air Force Base in Guam recorded wind gusts up to 58 mph, and just over 5 inches of rain. Flash flood warnings were in effect for the island on Sunday.     [FULL  STORY]

Factory caught for dumping wastewater into river

Taiwan News
Date: 2015-08-18
By: Ko Lin, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

Another factory complex was caught dumping untreated wastewater into a stream in

Factory caught for dumping wastewater into river. Central News Agency

Factory caught for dumping wastewater into river. Central News Agency

Taoyuan after complaint was filed by a local resident who informed authorities of the occurrence, reports said Tuesday.

According to Taoyuan’s Environmental Protection Bureau, it received an anonymous call in the morning saying the Pusin River by the city’s Wen-Chung Road had turned light purple.

Taoyuan City Councilor Wang Hao-yu was also informed of the incident, who said he learned the news by the same informer who had left a picture of the tainted river on his Facebook fan page.

Inspectors who rushed to the scene traced the contaminated river two kilometers south of the city all the way to Zhongli’s Yuandong Road near a railway track, reports said.     [FULL  STORY]

Second stage of Han Kuang war games set for September

Want China Times
Date: 2015-08-18
By: CNA and Staff Reporter

The second stage of Taiwan’s Han Kuang 31 series of military exercises will be held from

The commissioning of the Tuo Jiang corvette at Zuoying naval base in Kaohsiung, March 31. (File photo/CNA)

The commissioning of the Tuo Jiang corvette at Zuoying naval base in Kaohsiung, March 31. (File photo/CNA)

Sept. 7-11 on Taiwan proper and on the country’s outlying islands and will simulate an attack from mainland China, the country’s Ministry of National Defense said Tuesday.

The war games, which will include some live-fire drills, will see the ROC Army, Navy and Air Force test their joint operations in the event of war. They follow computer-aided war games held in May.

Major General Zhong Shu-ming, director of the Ministry of National Defense’s Joint Operation Division, said there will be more drills this year than last year.

The Navy will add five drills and the Air Force will have six more, with the participation of 69 more aircraft, Zhong said.     [FULL  STORY]

Student protesters return from walk across nation

Taipei Times
Date:  Aug 19, 2015
By: Abraham Gerber  /  Staff reporter

Two student-rights advocates returned to the main site of protests over high-school

Students Hsu Kuan-tse, left, and Chou Tzu-hsiang, accompanied by supporters, walk P03-150819-a1through downtown Taipei yesterday on the final leg of a nationwide walking tour to protest changes to high-school curriculum guidelines. Photo: Weng Yu-huang, Taipei Times

Students Hsu Kuan-tse, left, and Chou Tzu-hsiang, accompanied by supporters, walk P03-150819-a1through downtown Taipei yesterday on the final leg of a nationwide walking tour to protest changes to high-school curriculum guidelines. Photo: Weng Yu-huang, Taipei Times

curriculum guideline changes yesterday, completing a national walking tour to highlight the issue.

Hsu Kuan-tse (許冠澤) and Chou Tzu-hsiang (周子翔) led a parade of students and rights advocates in front of the Ministry of Education building for the final leg of the tour, shouting: “Reject black box procedures”; “Oppose brain-washing education”; and “Students are not idiots” as they marched in pouring rain to the ministry gates.

“I have already given up on ministry officials — no matter what you say, they do not listen,” Hsu said. “Eventually, when we grow up, we will take over [their] positions and do a better job.”

Hsu said that while he had kept his word, finishing a nationwide walk, Minister of Education Wu Se-hwa (吳思華) had broken his promise to publicize the names of members of the committee that approved controversial “fine-tuning” of social studies guidelines.     [FULL  STORY]

Japanese utility says special measures at nuclear power facility not necessary

Taipei Times
Date:  Aug 18, 2015
By: Reuters, TOKYO

Japanese utility Kyushu Electric Power yesterday said that it was monitoring activity at a

An aerial photograph shows smoke rising from Sakurajima, one of Japan’s most active volcanoes, on Saturday. Photo: Reuters

An aerial photograph shows smoke rising from Sakurajima, one of Japan’s most active volcanoes, on Saturday. Photo: Reuters

volcano near its Sendai nuclear plant, but did not need to take any special precautions after authorities warned of the risk of a larger-than-usual eruption.

The reactor is the first to be restarted under new safety standards put in place since the meltdowns at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant in 2011.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and much of Japanese industry want reactors to be switched on again to cut energy bills, but opinion polls show a majority of the public opposes the move after the nuclear crisis triggered by an earthquake and tsunami in March 2011.

The possibility of a significant eruption of Sakurajima, about 50km from Sendai, is a reminder of the volatile geology of Japan, which has 110 active volcanoes.     [FULL  STORY]

Tainan records second dengue death this year

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/08/18
By: Chang Rong-hsiang and Tung Ning

Taipei, Aug. 18 (CNA) An 87-year-old man in Tainan has died of dengue fever, the

Tainan City workers clean water-containing objects on the street. (Photo courtesy of the Tainan Department of Health)

Tainan City workers clean water-containing objects on the street. (Photo courtesy of the Tainan Department of Health)

second fatal case recorded in the southern city and in Taiwan this year, the Tainan Department of Health said Tuesday.

It said that since the start of the year, nearly 1,000 cases of dengue fever have been confirmed in Tainan, spread throughout 23 of the city’s 37 districts.

On Aug. 10, the first dengue death of the year was recorded, a 73-year-old man in the city’s South District.

The more recent fatality was a man from the West Central District, who died in hospital on Aug. 12, six days after he developed a fever. He had been suffering from cancer and a chronic lung disease, the health department said.     [FULL  STORY]