Taipei Times
Date: , Aug 15, 2015
By: Jason Pan  /  Staff reporter

A coalition of civic groups advocating sexual equality yesterday staged a protest in front

Members of gay rights groups protest outside the Ministry of Justice building in Taipei yesterday, accusing the ministry of using delaying tactics to postpone the passage of marriage equality legislation. Photo: CNA

of the Ministry of Justice building, calling on the government to approve amendments to allow same-sex marriage.

Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights groups, along with women’s empowerment and social welfare organizations, joined the demonstration and a press briefing in front of the building.

Taiwan Alliance to Promote Civil Partnership Rights chief executive officer Victoria Hsu (許秀雯) said the alliance wanted to rally support from the public and other civic groups to counter a recent online government survey, which she said was misleading and was designed to prevent the introduction of and deliberation on the “marriage equality” bill in the legislature.

Hsu was referring to the ministry’s online survey, posted on the National Development Council Web site earlier this month, which includes questions such as whether the legislature should approve the law on legalizing “same-sex marriage” and extending rights protection to same-sex couples.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/08/14
By: Maria Tsai

Taipei, Aug. 14 (CNA) Taiwan Water Corporation said Friday that residents in some parts of Xinzhuang, Tucheng, Banqiao, Luzhou and Zhonghe districts in New Taipei should store water to prepare for supply cuts on Saturday.

Heavy rains in the past few days have increased the turbidity of water from Nanshi River, one of the main sources of water in Taipei.

That has reduced the amount of water available to the capital city, decreasing the amount it can supply to neighboring New Taipei, the department said.     [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date: Aug 15, 2015

Wang Yu-kai is a 19-year-old young man, who lives in Yuanlin. When he was a child, his

Wang Yu-kai displays the tattoo image of his deceased parents on July 31 in Changhua County.
王煜凱露出刻著已故雙親圖樣的刺青。攝於七月三十一號，彰化縣。
Photo: Yen Hung-chun, Taipei Times
照片： 自由時報記者顏宏駿攝

parents passed away in separate traffic accidents. It had been his dream to tattoo his parents’ image on his body. After working at part-time jobs for four years, he eventually saved more than NT$10,000 for the tattoo fee. In early July, he paid a visit to the tattoo shop and imprinted his parents’ image on his body forever.

When his parents passed away in traffic accidents, Wang was only five years old. He was raised by his grandpa and grandma. His classmates called him “the orphan without a father or mother.” Whenever there was a setback in his life, he would feel an urge to take out his parents’ pictures from a drawer and tearfully spur himself on.

In his first year in junior high school, a tattoo shop was opened next door, which planted the seed in his mind to get a tattoo of his parents. He summoned up the courage to ask for the price, and the shop owner offered him NT$12,500 at a discount because the owner was touched by his affection for his parents. The image of his parents and the cost of the tattoo were deeply imprinted in the young man’s heart.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan News
Date: 2015-08-14
By: ERIKA KINETZ, Associated Press

SHANGHAI (AP) — Explosions that sent huge fireballs through China’s Tianjin port have

Deadly China blast disrupts Tianjin port. Associated Press (2015-08-14 10:56:26)

disrupted the flow of cars, oil, iron ore and other items through the world’s 10th largest port.

The blast sent shipping containers tumbling into one another, leaving them in bent, charred piles. Rows of new cars, lined up on vast lots for distribution across China, were reduced to blackened carcasses.

Ships carrying oil and “hazardous products” were barred from the port Thursday, the Tianjin Maritime Safety Administration said on its official microblog. It also said vessels were not allowed to enter the central port zone, which is near the blast site.

Tianjin is the 10th largest port in the world by container volume and the seventh largest in China, according to the World Shipping Council, moving more containers than the ports of Rotterdam, Hamburg and Los Angeles. It handles vast quantities of metal ore, coal, steel, cars and crude oil.     [FULL  STORY]

Want China Times
Date: 2015-08-14
By: CNA

The United States reiterated Thursday its obligations stipulated in the Taiwan Relations

Zhang Zhijun, center, talks to the press outside the US State Department, Aug. 14. (Photo/CNA)

Act and the responsibility to ensure that Taiwan has the ability to defend itself and be free from any coercion or intimidation.

John Kirby, a State Department spokesperson, made the remarks in a daily press briefing upon being asked about the status of the US security commitment toward Taiwan.

A meeting between visiting Zhang Zhijun, head of China’s Taiwan Affairs Office under the State Council, and deputy secretary of state Antony Blinken and assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Daniel Russel that same day drew media attention, as Taiwan is set to hold a presidential election in January 2016 and Chinese president Xi Jinping is scheduled to visit the United States in September.

Kirby declined to comment on whether the Taiwan election was among the topics being discussed.     [FULL  STORY]

MURKY WEB:Environmentalists said that turbid tap water following Typhoon Soudelor was caused by illegal developments in New Taipei City’s Wulai District

Taipei Times
Date: Aug 14, 2015
By: Chen Wei-han  /  Staff reporter

The Forestry Bureau disputed a claim yesterday that inadequate conservation of a 1981

A site at Dongjhakong River is pictured by the Forestry Bureau on Saturday last week after Typhoon Soudelor struck. Photo: CNA

landslide site upstream of the Nanshih River (南勢溪) in New Taipei City’s Wulai District (烏來) caused murky tap water during Typhoon Soudelor.

The bureau on Wednesday released aerial images of the landslide site at the Dongjhakong River (東札孔溪) — about 28km upstream of where the Nanshih River and Peishih River (北勢溪) converge — taken on Monday after the typhoon, amid speculation that the site was the main contributor to the turbid water at Nanshih River, which is the major source of water supply for Taipei residents.

The collapsed area measured 10.99 hectares, which the bureau said was actually 0.84 hectares less than it was two years ago, suggesting well-managed conservation at the area.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/08/14
By: Wen Kuei-hsiang and Elizabeth Hsu

Taipei, Aug. 14 (CNA) A Taiwanese exchange college student has been listed as missing

MOFA headquarters in Taipei

by the Japanese authorities, a senior official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said Friday, adding that a search has been launched for the girl.

Chou Shyue-yow (周學佑), deputy director-general of the MOFA’s Department of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, said the student, identified by the surname Lu (鹿), has been put on Japan’s national list of people unaccounted for, which is circulated among all port and border control units of that country.

So far, there have been no reports that Lu has left Japan and the MOFA has been coordinating with the Japanese search efforts, Chou said.

Earlier in the day, opposition Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Huang Wei-che (黃偉哲) hosted a press conference in Taipei along with Lu’s grandfather, in which the lawmaker said that Lu, a student at Shu-Zen Junior College of Medicine and Management, left for Kagoshima, Japan in September last year, where she was enrolled as an exchange student at the International University Of Kagoshima.