Page Three

Cabinet credits policy for surge in tourists

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 02, 2017
By: Staff writer, with CNA

The number of tourists from Australia, New Zealand and Southeast and South Asian nations in November last year rose 23 percent from a year earlier, which the Cabinet attributed to the government’s “new southbound policy.”

The Cabinet on Friday said that 195,419 tourists came in November last year from the 18 nations targeted by the policy.

The number of tourists from all the nations targeted by the policy, except Nepal, increased in the month, with arrivals from Cambodia, Bangladesh, Thailand and Vietnam increasing by more than 90 percent from a year earlier, the Cabinet said.

From January to November last year, the number of tourists coming from Cambodia rose 85.4 percent annually to 3,111; arrivals from Thailand grew 52.1 percent to 164,021; tourists from Brunei rose 51.2 percent to 3,795; and visitors from India grew 38.2 percent to 30,986, the Cabinet said.    [FULL  STORY]

President’s spring couplet panned by literati

The China Post
Date: January 2, 2017
By: Sun Hsin Hsuan

President Tsai Ing-wen’s unusual use of Taiwanese for an annual spring couplet on Sunday has come under fire — not for its language, but for what literature critics have described as its “incorrect” structure.

National Museum of Taiwanese Literature head Liao Chen-fu (廖振富), while praising the president for “bringing public awareness to Taiwanese literature,” gave a poor review of the couplet itself, saying: “The president’s spring couplets could probably count as two lines of new year greetings, but couplets? Not so much.”

Spring couplets are two of lines of poetry that are governed by a set of complex rules.

Couplets are required to have the same number of Chinese characters in both lines, while the lexical category of each character must be the same as its corresponding character, and the tone pattern of one line must be the inverse of the other.    [FULL  STORY]

Medical clinics mull fee increase following changes to labor law

The China Post
Date: January 1, 2017
By: The China Post news staff

TAIPEI, Taiwan — Private medical clinics are mulling an increase to patients’ payments as a result of rising costs following the implementation of the five-day workweek.

Tseng Tzu-chan, head of the Taiwan Medical Clinic Association (TMCA), said the five-day workweek stipulated by the revised labor law was adding operational costs — in the form of more overtime pay — to the private clinics offering services during the weekend, according to the Central News Agency.

To cover the extra costs, clinics may have to have patients pay more in registration fees, which are at the clinics’ discretion, Tseng reportedly said.

Registration fees requested from patients by clinics usually range from NT$50 to NT$100.

Clinics cannot adjust the patients’ copayments set by the National Health Insurance program.    [FULL  STORY]

A rare comet to arrive after the New Year’s Eve countdown

Taiwan News
Date: 2016/12/31
By: Sophia Yang, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

Taipei (Taiwan News) – If you are staying out late for New Year’s Eve countdown party, look up to the sky. You may be able to spot a comet streaking across the heavens, just two and half hours after the stroke of midnight.

The bluish-green comet with a thin fan-shaped tail is expected to appear at 2:30 a.m. on January 1, 2017, Taiwan time. That’s when it will be closest to the sun.

However, the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientists noted that Honda-Mrkos-Pajdusakova, or Comet 45P, might be too dim to see with the naked eye. People are advised to grab a pair of binoculars or look through a telescope near the crescent moon for the best results.   [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan’s gay marriage debate enters ‘dialogue phase’: president

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/12/31
By: Christie Chen and Sophia Yeh

Taipei, Dec. 31 (CNA) President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said on Saturday that the debate over same-sex marriage in Taiwan has moved on from the “conflict” phase to the “dialogue” phase, in the same way as other countries when dealing with divisive issues.

When faced with such issues, citizens often go through a period of conflict before reverting to discussion and finally choosing a path that is more acceptable to everyone, Tsai said at a press conference held on New Year’s Eve, when asked what she expects to see in the next legislative session on the issue of same-sex marriage.

“We are in the same situation right now and we are handling this step by step. In the previous stage we saw conflict, but now we are turning to dialogue,” Tsai said.

A draft bill that will legalize same-sex marriage and allow married gay couples to adopt children passed its initial screening at the legislative Judiciary and Organic Laws and Statutes Committee on Dec. 26 amid fierce protest. As the Legislature is now in recess and the new session begins in February, further discussion on the bill is not expected to take place until April or May next year.   [FULL  STORY]

Court sentences four to prison after scuffle with police

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 01, 2017
By: Jason Pan / Staff reporter

The Taipei District Court on Friday found activist Hung Chung-yen (洪崇晏) and three others guilty of insulting a public official or office during a protest in 2014 that led to scuffles with law enforcement officers.

The protest came on the heels of the Sunflower movement after Hung and other campaigners circulated messages on social media calling for people to “walk by” the Taipei Chungcheng District First Police Precinct, one block from the Legislative Yuan Building, on April 11, 2014.

Hung was sentenced to 55 days in prison.

The court found him not guilty of violating provisions of the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法).

Hsiao Nien-cheng (蕭年呈) was found guilty on two counts of offenses of obstructing an officer in discharge of duties and given a 80-day prison term.    [FULL  STORY]

‘Nazi rally’ remarks ‘show envoy unfit for job’

The China Post
Date: January 1, 2017
By: The China Post news staff

TAIPEI, Taiwan — Former Foreign Affairs Minister Francisco Lung-lien Ou (歐鴻鍊) has slammed Taiwan’s incumbent representative to Germany, Jhy-wey Hsieh (謝志偉), as being extremely unfit for the post, accusing him of politicizing the recent controversy over students dressing as Nazis for a mock rally.

A a press conference hosted by the National Policy Foundation, Ou said that Hsieh is a representative of the Republic of China in Taiwan — not the ruling Democrat Progressive Party (DPP).

“He failed to recognize his own capacity and lacked professional diplomatic knowledge and training, and made undesirable and ridiculous remarks about the incident, seriously abusing his post as a diplomat,” Ou said.

Ou was referring to remarks Hsieh made on Facebook saying that a key reason the student Nazi incident at a Hsinchu City high school occurred was that “the spirits of Nazism still exist in Taiwan.”    [FULL  STORY]

‘Illegal’ Airbnb operators to be fined under new legislation airbnb

The News Lens
Date: 2016/12/30

Amendments to the Act for the Development of Tourism to prevent unlicensed hotel and Airbnb

Photo Credit：Open Grid Scheduler @Flickr CC BY SA 2.0

operators from advertising their services passed a third reading at the Legislative Yuan on Dec. 23. Under the new provisions, commonly known as the “Airbnb Provision,” unlicensed operators found to be illegally advertising their services on the Airbnb website will be fined between NT$30,000 (about US$930) to NT$300,000 (about US$9,300), United Daily News reports.

The provision also allows the relevant authorities to be accompanied by police when investigating suspected unlicensed operators, and those who report unlicensed hotel operators to the authorities are entitled to a reward, the Taiwanese Apple Daily reports.

Read more: Airbnb Faces an Uncertain Future in Taiwan  
[FULL  STORY]

Merry Christmas: Uncle Sam wants dual U.S.-Taiwan citizens to pay up

Taiwan signs deal with the U.S. giving IRS access to Taiwanese bank accounts of Americans, including dual citizens

Taiwan News
dATE: 2016/12/30
By: Keoni Everington, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

Three days before Christmas, Taiwan and the United States worked together to send Americans living in

Poster of Uncle Sam saying, “I WANT MORE!” (Image by Kaz Vorpal on flickr)

Taiwan a special Christmas gift — the long-rumored “Fat Coffee Agreement” — which will enable the IRS to crackdown on Taiwanese that either hold a U.S. passport or green card and earn income overseas, was signed by the two nations, though lawmakers have vowed to veto it for being “unfair.”

Lawmakers currently oppose the terms of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FACTA), mockingly referred to as the “Fat Coffee Agreement” in Chinese, as it collects data from “non-cooperative” clients from Taiwan banks, but does not require U.S. banks to reciprocate for Taiwan’s taxation bureau.

Effective April 2017, approximately 5,000 Taiwanese citizens who are also American citizens or hold U.S. green cards will be required to report all overseas investments to the IRS.

The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) said that although it had signed a FATCA cooperation agreement with the United States, the agreement would have to be approved by the Legislative Yuan and signed by the President. Under the terms of the new agreement, the United States will be able to request Taiwanese financial institutions to provide information on “uncooperative clients” when the United States suspects a citizen or green card holder is committing tax evasion.    [FULL  STORY]

Tsai to transit in Houston, San Francisco on Central American trip

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/12/30
By: Lu Hsin-hui, Tang Pei-chun and Elizabeth Hsu

Taipei, Dec. 30 (CNA) President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) will make two stopovers in the United States — in

President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) (CNA file photo)

Houston and San Francisco — on her nine-day Central American trip next month, the Presidential Office said Friday.

Tsai is scheduled to depart Taiwan on Jan. 7 for Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala and El Salvador, four of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies in Central America, said Presidential Office spokesman Alex Huang (黃重諺).

The president is due to arrive in Houston at 9:30 a.m. Jan. 7 and stay for one night before continuing on her state visit to the four countries, Huang told the press.

On the return leg, Tsai will stop over in San Francisco on the night of Jan. 13 and depart for Taiwan the next day, he said.    [FULL  STORY]