Taiwan News
Dater: 2020/10/07
By: Ching-Tse Cheng, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The Ultra Music Festival is set to make an unexpected return to Taiwan next month and will feature spectacular stages and popular EDM headliners in the country's capital.

The one-day electronic music event is scheduled to take place at Taipei's Dajia Riverside Park on Nov. 14, making its first appearance since the coronavirus pandemic. The organizers were previously forced to cancel their flagship Miami festival and an Abu Dhabi edition of the event due to the global outbreak.

According to ETtoday, this year's celebration of electronic music will host international DJs Alesso, Slander, Kayzo, and Vini Vici, along with performances by other supporting acts. The Swedish star Alesso is especially familiar to Taiwanese fans for his collaboration on a soulful rendition of "I Wanna Know" with the country's pop diva Jolin Tsai (蔡依林) in 2016.
[FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 10/07/20207
By: Matthew Mazzetta

Taipei, Oct. 7 (CNA) A Chinese fishing vessel caught operating in Taiwan's territorial seas around Penghu was escorted into international waters on Wednesday, after being impounded for 44 days and fined NT$2 million (US$69,691), according to the Coast Guard Administration (CGA).

In a press release , the CGA's Penghu Offshore Flotilla said it detained the unmarked vessel and its crew on Aug. 24 after discovering it operating in Taiwanese waters.

Following an investigation, authorities imposed a NT$2 million fine against the vessel's owners for violations of the Act Governing Relations between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area, the Coast Guard said.

On Tuesday, Penghu County Government's Agriculture and Fisheries Bureau removed two net haulers and other fishing equipment from the ship, before it was escorted by the Coast Guard into international waters, the statement said.    [FULL  STORY]

‘SLAP ON THE WRIST’: Demonstrators said that St John’s University has since August withheld the pay of about 30 educators who refused to accept a 50 percent salary cut

Taipei Times
Date: Oct 08, 2020
By: Sherry Hsiao / Staff reporter

Educators from New Taipei City’s St John’s University and members of the Taiwan Higher Education Union yesterday staged a protest outside the Ministry of Education in Taipei demanding that the ministry take action beyond imposing fines on the school, which they claimed owed faculty salaries.

Speaking outside the ministry, Lin Po-yi (林柏儀), director of the union’s organization department, said that to force teachers to accept having their salaries cut by half, the university has since August “maliciously” not paid salaries to about 30 teachers who rejected the pay cuts.

As of Monday, the university owed teachers salaries for three months,” he said.

The union estimates that it owes about 30 teachers NT$10 million (US$345,244), he said.
[FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 06 October, 2020
By: Paula Chao

The Legislature has passed a resolution to resume formal diplomatic ties between Taiwan and the United States.

The resolution was proposed by the opposition KMT and adopted on Tuesday. The KMT said given that relations between Taipei and Washington have seen tremendous progress following the recent visits by high-ranking US officials, the DPP government should seek to resume ties with the United States.

The two sides severed formal diplomatic relations in 1979 after Washington switched its diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing. 

However, in an interview with the US’s public radio network NPR last month, Foreign Minister Joseph Wu said that Taiwan is not seeking to set up formal diplomatic ties with Washington at this time.    [FULL  STORY]

Taipei's Ko describes 2024 presidential election as 'boring subject'

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/10/062
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The mayors of four cities in northern Taiwan gathered for a cultural event on Tuesday (Oct. 6), but three of them refused to discuss their alleged presidential ambitions.

President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was re-elected for a second and final term earlier this year, and the next election is not until January 2024. However, speculation has erupted over the likely contenders to succeed her.

Three of the most frequently heard names were seen together on stage Tuesday, but none wanted to answer the media's questions about future elections, CNA reported.

Taoyuan Mayor Cheng Wen-tsang (鄭文燦) of Tsai's DPP hosted Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), who also chairs the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), and New Taipei City Mayor Hou Yu-ih (侯友宜) of the main opposition party the Kuomintang (KMT).    [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date: Oct 07, 2020
By: Lee I-chia / Staff reporter

The Taiwanese Osteoporosis Association yesterday urged people to start doing strength training regularly and maintain sufficient protein intake before the age of 50 to prevent loss of mobility due to aging.

Association chairman Wing Chan (陳榮邦), director of Taipei Municipal Wanfang Hospital’s Department of Radiology, said that Taiwan’s demographic structure is changing drastically and is expected to become a super-aged society by 2025.

The elderly population was only about 1.49 million (7.1 percent of the total population) in 1993, but it is expected to reach more than 4.7 million (20.1 percent of the total population) by 2025, so maintaining mobility for elderly people would become an important issue, he said.

“About one in three people in Taiwan have hidden risks of experiencing mobility problems,” Chan said, adding that an estimated 2.86 million people have low bone density (osteoporosis), an estimated 810,000 people have low muscle mass (sarcopenia) and an estimated 3.53 million people have joint disorders or degenerative joint disease.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 10/06/2020
By: Yu Hsiao-han and Matthew Mazzetta

Taipei, Oct. 6 (CNA) Around seven in 10 Taiwanese adults support the concept of hospice care and believe that emergency medical treatment may not always be the right answer for terminally ill patients, according to the results of a recent survey.

The Hospice Foundation of Taiwan announced the results of its survey on end-of-life issues at a press conference on Tuesday, ahead of a film screening it plans to hold this weekend in honor of World Hospice and Palliative Care Day.

The survey, conducted by the market research firm Viewpoint, found high levels of support for issues such as patients' rights and palliative care for the terminally ill.

Some 72 percent of the survey respondents said they would inform their parents in honest terms if one of them received a terminal diagnosis, compared to only 55.8 percent 10 years ago, said Viewpoint Managing Director Lee Hsin-yu (李欣瑜).    [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 05 October, 2020
By: Andrew Ryan

Taiwanese lawmakers on Monday questioned a Tsai administration official about whether the results of the upcoming US election will have an impact on Taiwan’s defense budget. That’s in light of Taiwan’s larger-than-usual defense budget for fiscal 2021, which was created during US President Donald Trump’s term in office.

The United States factors prominently in Taiwan’s defense considerations because the US is required by law to provide Taiwan with the weapons it needs to defend itself. 

The minister of Taiwan’s budgeting and statistics agency, Chu Tzer-ming, responded to questions at the legislature on Monday, explaining the reason for this year’s larger budget. 
[FULL  STORY]

• Cooperation on island’s defence and security needs are central topics of the 2020 US-Taiwan Defence Industry Conference
• Kuomintang chairman Johnny Chiang will address delegates, indicating the party’s support for a closer US-Taiwan relationship0

South China Morning Post
Date: 5 Oct, 2020
By: Lawrence Chung

Officials and military experts from Taiwan and the United States will meet via video conference to discuss which weapons would be best for the island’s self-defence as tensions escalate between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait.

During the 2020 US-Taiwan Defence Industry Conference, which is expected to begin on Monday US time, Taiwan’s deputy defence minister Chang Guan-chung is expected to brief the US side on the weaponry most needed and urgently sought by the island after seeing growing military intimidation from Beijing.

Tensions in the Taiwan Strait have risen in the past two months since the United States sent two high-ranking cabinet officials – Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar and undersecretary of state Keith Krach – to Taiwan on August 9 and September 17 respectively, moves seen as highly provocative to Beijing

Beijing has sent dozens of warplanes for deliberate incursions into Taiwan’s air-defence identification zone, with at least 37 crossing a median line

 in the narrow strait between Taiwan and the mainland. The incursions were meant as a sign of Beijing’s displeasure over the visits, which were aimed at consolidating US-Taiwan substantive ties in the absence of formal relations.    [FULL  STORY]