Page Three

Taichung group visits Hong Kong to promote central Taiwan tourism

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/03/09
By: Hao Xue-qing and Lauren Hung

Taipei, March 9 (CNA) A tourism delegation from Taichung City is visiting Hong

Photo courtesy of Taichung City Government

Photo courtesy of Taichung City Government

Kong to promote tourism for the central part of Taiwan.

The 50-member delegation, led by Chen Cheng-shan, chief of the Taichung Tourism Bureau, will launch a series promotion activities, including attending a live program on Phoenix Television, to recommend the specialties of central Taiwan, including bicycle tours, hot spring, farm products, leisure agriculture and pastries to Hong Kong people.

Phoenix TV show has been popular in mainland China and Hong Kong.

Chen said that there has been sign of decreasing number of mainland tourists to Taiwan recently, but he is still optimistic about the development tourism industry in central Taiwan, especially after the opening of the National Taichung Theater, and the Southern Branch of National Palace Museum in Chiayi County.

Chen expected that the number of visits to central Taiwan by Hong Kong and Macau people will increase 10 percent this year.     [SOURCE]

Nuclear agency to assess waste disposal urged

SAFETY ISSUES:Professor Lee Chao-shing said that finding a safe medium-term storage site for spent fuel would be difficult given the nation’s geology

Taipei Times
Date: Mar 10, 2016
By: Abraham Gerber / Staff reporter

An independent agency should be established to oversee the disposal of the nation’s nuclear waste, New Power Party (NPP) Legislator Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) said yesterday, as controversy continues over plans to store spent nuclear fuel following the decommissioning of the nation’s nuclear power plants.

“The Nuclear Materials and Radioactive Waste Management Act (放射性物料管理法) is outdated and does not reflect the necessity of allowing the public to participate in the review process,” Huang said at a public hearing at the Legislative Yuan.

His New Taipei City district is home to the Guosheng Nuclear Power Plant in Wanli District (萬里) and the site of the now-sealed Fourth Nuclear Power Plant.

“The law lacks any conception of short and medium-term temporary storage, only focusing on final storage of the materials,” Huang said.

“However, we all know that final storage will not happen for the foreseeable future and we have to think about how we are going to handle the problem in the interim,” Huang said, adding that an independent agency should be established to decide the matter according to an open review process based on objective guidelines.      [FULL  STORY]

Military needs week to determine sanctions

Taiwan News
Date: 2016-03-08
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – The Ministry of National Defense said Tuesday it

The list of disciplinary measures could only be announced after the investigation had been completed, the defense spokesman David Lo said..

The list of disciplinary measures could only be announced after the investigation had been completed, the defense spokesman David Lo said..

would take a week before it could announce which military police officers would be disciplined over the search without warrant of a home for documents from the White Terror era.

A public uproar followed recent reports about the February 19 search of the home of a man surnamed Wei after he had announced online he would be selling old military documents.

With politicians clamoring for disciplinary action against the officers involved in the search, the ministry said Tuesday it would respond to legislators’ demands and conduct a thorough investigation of the incident within a week. However, that also meant that the list of disciplinary measures could only be announced after the investigation had been completed, a defense spokesman said.

Asked by reporters about the likely fates of Political Warfare Bureau chief Wen Chen-kuo and Military Police Commander Hsu Chang, the ministry said it did not exclude the possibility that there had been problems with the procedure surrounding the search. If there had been, Wen and Hsu might face disciplinary action, but the military and the officers should be given the necessary time and respect for their rights while the investigation continued, the ministry said. At present, the outside world was critical of Wen and Hsu, but the outcome of the investigation had to be waited for before it could be judged whether punitive action was needed, according to the spokesman.     [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Astronomical Museum to air solar eclipse live online

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/03/07
By: Ku Chuan and Lilian Wu

Taipei, March 7 (CNA) A total solar eclipse that will occur Wednesday will be

(CNA file photo)

(CNA file photo)

aired live by the Taipei Astronomical Museum on its website because it will be only partially visible in Taiwan.

The partial eclipse that can be seen in Taiwan will be between 8 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. that day, the museum said.

The museum will work with other observatories around the world that can observe the eclipse to provide a real-time broadcast of the event on the site http://eclipse.tam.gov.tw, enabling the public to follow the eclipse’s progress and compare its changes in different areas.

This will be the first solar eclipse since May 21, 2012. The next eclipse will come on Jan. 6, 2019, it said.

The total eclipse will start from the Indian Ocean, and pass through parts of Indonesia, including Sumatra, Borneo and Sulawesi, before entering the Pacific.     [FULL  STORY]

Women make large-scale socioeconomic gains in Taiwan

Taiwan Today
Date: March 8, 2016

Taiwan’s women are making significant socioeconomic gains in education,

Women are playing an increasingly active role in Taiwan as reflected by their rising socioeconomic status in recent years. (CNA)

Women are playing an increasingly active role in Taiwan as reflected by their rising socioeconomic status in recent years. (CNA)

labor participation and wages, according to a report released March 4 by the ROC Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics.

Last year, 45 percent of women aged 15 and above held tertiary education degrees compared to 39.3 percent for men. From 2012, more Taiwan women were tertiary-educated than men.

The average monthly salary of women in the industrial and services sectors was NT$43,709 (US$1,340) in 2015, up 2.9 percent from the year before. This trumped growth of 2.3 percent for men.

Labor participation rates for women continued an upward trend of recent years to reach 50.7 percent. The numbers were under those of men in all age categories, with 30.4 percent for 55-59 years the lowest result.

The DGBAS said labor participation rates reflect Taiwan’s marriage and fertility statistics, adding that the average age of first marriage for women increased to 29.9 in 2014, while for mothers it was 31.5.     [FULL  STORY]

Ko criticized after backing military

Taipei Times
Date: Mar 09, 2016
By: Sean Lin / Staff reporter

Amid the outrage triggered by the military police’s alleged illegal search of civilian property and confiscation of White Terror era documents, Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) urged the public not to overreact, saying that the military should not be crucified over the incident.

“In my opinion, the military is the nation’s lifeline. If there has been a mistake, just correct it. There is no need to ‘decimate’ the military. It would not be in the nation’s interests if the military collapsed,” Ko said when asked for his opinion on the issue.

“I guess that nobody would say [the search] was entirely appropriate. [The Ministry of National Defense] should just correct what needs to be corrected. Do not kick up a major fuss. I am strongly against this kind of social atmosphere,” he said.

The remarks quickly triggered an outpouring of criticism among the capital’s residents.

“Does he hear himself when he talks?” Taipei resident Lin Ming-ching (林明慶) said.

“The point is the abuse of power. If it had been ordinary troops, no one would have cared,” Lin said.     [FULL  STORY]

Antinuclear activist calls for demolition of Nuke 4

Taiwan News
Date: 2016-03-08
By: George Liao, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

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Patients wait for their numbers to be called at a hospital emergency room, Tuesday, March 8. Taiwan is not yet clear of the flu. The CDC predicts that cases of the infection could reach 1,900, and the death toll may climb to 290 by the end of March. (CNA)

The Taiwanese government should demolish the construction of the fourth nuclear power plant lest an insensitive president should reactivate it in the future, Taiwanese novelist turned antinuclear activist Liu Li-er said on Tuesday during a discussion with New Power Party legislators.

Liu had a talk with NPP legislators Huang Kuo-chang, Hsu Yung-ming, Hung Tzu-yung and Kawlo Iyun Pacidal at the Legislature on Tuesday noon.

She thanked the NPP for putting the issues of complete denuclearization and disposal of nuclear wastes under the spotlight.

The government should announce demolition of the fourth nuclear plant so that no presidents in the future can unpack it, Liu said, adding that the potential danger of the plant has become public knowledge.

The fourth plant is located in northern New Taipei City. A great many Taiwanese people are concerned about the safety of such facilities in earthquake-prone regions of Taiwan following the 2011 Fukushima disaster in Japan.     [FULL  STORY]

Tainan decries MOI household registration change

Taipei Times
Date: Mar 08, 2016
By: Huang Wen-huang, Lee Hsin-fang and Jake Chung / Staff reporters, with staff writer

Tainan has cried foul after the Ministry of the Interior announced an update to its online household registration system that prevents the city government from saving changes with the words “same-sex couples” or other key words.

The Tainan City Government said the ministry’s claims that the move was just a system upgrade required by technical issues was actually a major step back on human rights specifically targeting Tainan.

The governments of Taipei, Taichung and Kaohsiung, Tainan and Chiayi have adopted an addendum to allow same-sex couples to exercise the same rights as family members in medical emergencies, such as signing surgery release forms and being allowed to visit hospitalized partners, by noting the partnerships on household registration records.

Same-sex marriage is not legal in Taiwan.

According to the Tainan City Government, the ministry informed it of an impending system update to incorporate additional checks on “personal affairs registration” that would impose error messages on any items that conflicted with legal regulations on what to be included in the household registration.

The ministry said that since same-sex marriages are not considered legal under the Civic Code (民法) and the Household Registration Act (戶籍法), registration of same-sex couples could not be completed. It said that it is simply following the law and is not trying to block the registrations by intentionally imposing extra technical hurdles.     [FULL  STORY]

6 social design projects in Taipei set to deal with social issues

WDC Taipei 2016 seeks to promote deeper engagement between designers, organizations, and enterprises in Taipei City and the international community.

Taiwan News
Date: 2016-03-07
By: Taiwan News, Staff Writer

World Design Capital® (WDC) Taipei 2016’s Open Call initiative will see 6739775innovative international organizations and groups like CONTINUUM (USA, Italy, Korea, and China), the United Nations University (Germany), and the British Council join forces with Taiwan-based counterparts.

Together, the Open Call teams will bring a multitude of carefully researched social design interventions to Taipei residents during the WDC Taipei year – from playgrounds built of junk to inner city recycling vending machines, traditional food re-design to experimental lunch schemes.

Alice Wang Design (Taiwan) and British Council Taiwan join forces to create healthy redesigns of local food, including an installation by London-based food design studio, Bompas & Parr, and CONTINUUM and IxDA Taiwan collaborate to bring local farmers, “empty nesters,” and Taipei’s young workers together in an experimental public lunch scheme.

Working with nearby residents, AGUA (Taiwan) and Basurama (Spain) will transform two sites at a historic Taipei City military facility turned public park into playgrounds made of found materials. To innovate Taipei’s existing recycling practices, a Reverse Vending Machine by REnato Lab (Taiwan) and United Nations University (Germany) will recycle or repair broken household items donated by the public.

Local social innovation organization, 5% Design Action, champions an international project that reinvents current strategies for aged care in Taiwan, and the Chinese Institute of Urban Design (Taiwan) are behind Citizen of Tomorrow–a public mouthpiece initiative that aims to give Taipei residents a voice in city planning.     [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Astronomical Museum to air solar eclipse live online

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/03/07
By: Ku Chuan and Lilian Wu

Taipei, March 7 (CNA) A total solar eclipse that will occur Wednesday will be

(CNA file photo)

(CNA file photo)

aired live by the Taipei Astronomical Museum on its website because it will be only partially visible in Taiwan.

The partial eclipse that can be seen in Taiwan will be between 8 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. that day, the museum said.

The museum will work with other observatories around the world that can observe the eclipse to provide a real-time broadcast of the event on the site http://eclipse.tam.gov.tw, enabling the public to follow the eclipse’s progress and compare its changes in different areas.

This will be the first solar eclipse since May 21, 2012. The next eclipse will come on Jan. 6, 2019, it said.

The total eclipse will start from the Indian Ocean, and pass through parts of Indonesia, including Sumatra, Borneo and Sulawesi, before entering the Pacific.     [FULL  STORY]