Focus Taiwan
Date: 01/27/2020
By: Sie Jing-wun and William Yen

Taipei, Jan. 27 (CNA) A strong weather front will cause temperatures to plummet over the next two days, with snow possible in mountainous areas, according to the Central Weather Bureau (CWB) Monday.

Due to the weather front, daytime highs in low-lying areas are expected to range from 15-18 degrees Celsius in northern Taiwan and 21-25 degrees in other parts of the country on Monday, the CWB said.

The mercury is likely to fall to 13-15 degrees at night in the western half of Taiwan and 17-18 degrees in Hualien and Taitung, according to the bureau.

Members of the public are advised to wear warm clothing when out and about, the CWB said.
[FULL  STORY8]

HOLIDAY PROJECT: The Public Works Department had set a 168-hour schedule, before reducing it to 94 hours, but work crews managed to shave seven more hours off

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 28, 2020
By: Lee I-chia  /  Staff reporter

The dismantlement of the Chongqing S Road (重慶南路) overpass, which served as an access ramp

to Zhongzheng Bridge (中正橋) in Taipei, was completed yesterday morning, seven hours ahead of schedule.

The overpass, which connected to Heping W Road (和平西路), and the Ziqiang Market (自強市場) under the overpass, were built in 1972.

However, given the wear and tear on the overpass and the shuttering of most of the stores in the market, which had mainly sold secondhand household appliances and furniture, the Taipei City Government announced last year that the overpass would be torn down during this year’s Lunar New Year holiday.

The New Construction Office said removing the overpass is the first step of a project to revive Zhongzheng (中正) and Wanhua (萬華) districts, the Taipei Public Works Department’s New Construction Office said.    [FULL  STORY]

Eurasia Review
Date: January 26, 2020
By Observer Research Foundation
By Harsh V. Pant

One of the biggest political stories of the year so far has been Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen securing a second term in a sweeping electoral victory which saw her frontally challenging the might of China. Her victory allowed her to underscore that “Taiwan is showing the world how much we cherish our free democratic way of life and how much we cherish our nation.” The target of this barb was very clear both in Taipei and in Beijing and as the two recalibrate their relationship, there would be a recognition that perhaps China-Taiwan ties would never be the same again.

In her victory speech, Tsai challenged China to give up brandishing threats to the island, underlining that “peace means that China must abandon threats of force against Taiwan” and hoping that “the Beijing authorities understand that democratic Taiwan, and our democratically elected government, will not concede to threats and intimidation.” It’s a tall order, of course, and Tsai knows it.

But she is a politician who till some time back was facing a sure shot defeat with low wages and controversial pension reform pulling down her approval ratings to as low as 15%. This had resulted in Tsai and her Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) suffering a crushing defeat in the November 2018 local elections while the opposition Kuomintang (KMT) gaining traction primarily due to economic issues. KMT and its leader Han Kuo-yu has been promising closer economic ties with Beijing for economic betterment. Meanwhile, Beijing was busy intimidating Taiwan and Tsai, gradually taking away the limited number of diplomatic partners of Taiwan, banning Chinese tourists from visiting the island and showcasing its military muscle by intruding its air and naval power into Taiwan’s vicinity. In a sign of China’s growing economic heft around the globe that only 15 countries now recognise the self-governing territory of Taiwan as a sovereign nation.

As a result, Tsai would have fought these elections with her back to the wall. But that was not to be as Taiwan’s relationship with China emerged as the central issue in the election campaign and made Tsai the natural choice for most Taiwanese. Beijing’s mishandling of the situation in Hong Kong, in particular, galvanised the Taiwanese voters in defending their national identity. Beijing’s much touted one country, two systems formula is viewed as a failure in Hong Kong and in Taiwan only 4.5 per cent of Taiwanese currently support the idea of “unification” with China.    [FULL  STORY]

Patient rejections due to insufficient hospital beds, front-line medical staff breakdowns in risky working environment

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/01/26
By: Chris Chang, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — As the outbreak of the 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) continues to plague Wuhan, China, the whole city is falling into chaos and panic because of insufficient medical resources and daily necessities.

Facing a surging number of patients, hospitals in Wuhan are struggling to deal with the overwhelming demand. Patients with fevers are fainting in hospitals after hours spent in queues, while others with serious symptoms are being asked to go home because there are no more hospital beds, reports The Epoch Times.

"It is now difficult just to receive a confirmed diagnosis from doctors because hospitals are so crammed with people," a Wuhan citizen shares in a video. "The emergency calls do not work at all, and the long waiting in the hospitals is definitely accelerating the infection rate."

According to him, the majority of citizens in Wuhan were not even wearing facial masks in public before the central government announced the city's lockdown on Jan. 23 in order to prevent the further spread of the epidemic.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 01/26/2.020
By: Flor Wang and Liao Yu-yang

Taipei, Jan. 26 (CNA) In a bid to tap the full potential of women entrepreneurs, Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) is set to organize for the first time a trade promotion delegation exclusively composed of female entrepreneurs this year.

The delegation is scheduled to visit Australia, New Zealand and Indonesia as part of TAITRA's efforts to help women better explore foreign markets and gain a greater role in Taiwan's foreign trade in line with the government's policy and a World Trade Organization (WTO) declaration, TAITRA said.

The three countries are covered by the government's New Southbound Policy, which has been broached by the administration of President Tsai Ing-wen after she assumed office in May 2016, to boost two-way trade and investment with countries in Southeast Asia, South Asia as well as Australia and New Zealand.

The reason why these countries were selected is simply because there have been relatively few promotions targeting them, TAITRA said.    [FULL  STORY]

OUTDOOR TRIPS: The Taiwan Alzheimer’s Disease Association and a doctor at Tzu Chi Hospital in Sindian offer tips for keeping people with dementia safe when in public

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 27, 2020
By: Yang Mien-jieh, Chiu Shu-yu and Jake Chung  /  Staff reporters, with staff writer

While the Lunar New Year holiday is often a time for family gatherings and outings, it is

also a time when people with Alzheimer’s disease can easily get lost when out in public, the Taiwan Alzheimer’s Disease Association said.

People with Alzheimer’s or other forms of dementia should be accompanied by at least two family members at all times when out in public during the holiday, and it is important to hold their hands, association secretary-general Tang Li-yu (湯麗玉) said.

Family members should take a photograph of a relative with dementia before leaving the house, and a piece of paper with family contact information should be put in the person’s pocket, backpack or purse, Tang said.

GPS tracker bracelets should also be worn to help prevent dementia patients from becoming lost, she said.    [FULL  STORY]

Travel Trade Gazette (TTG)
24 JAN 2020
By: Andrew Doherty

Taiwan might be 6,069 miles away, but the UK travel trade can expect a closer relationship with the East Asian state than ever before.

In December the Taiwan Tourism Bureau opened its first London headquarters – the second European centre after Frankfurt – to bolster UK visitor numbers.

“The UK is the largest outbound market in Europe to Taiwan. We hope that the opening of the office in London will help travel agencies and tour operators work closely with Taiwan to develop a tailor-made programme for UK visitors,” said Joey Chou, director- general of the Taiwan Tourism Bureau.

By the close of 2019, Taiwan had welcomed more than 70,000 UK arrivals – an 8% year-on-year growth from January to October.    [FULL  STORY]

Decider
Date: Jan 24, 2020
By: John Serba

A Sun landed five Golden Horse awards — the Taiwanese version of the Oscars — including a best picture win, prior to its international Netflix release. Director Chung Mong-Hong’s family drama has many components of a “prestige” film: An epic 156-minute runtime, resonant characters and themes, and barely a whiff of comedy. The latter two points are easier to hurdle than the first one, which prompts one to wonder if the movie is strong enough to demand such a mighty long sit.

A SUN: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Somewhere in Taipei’s middle class exists a typical family, a father, a mother and two sons: Chen (Chen Yi-Wen) is a driving instructor, Qin (Samantha Ko) is a hairdresser, A-Ho (Wu Chien-Ho) is the ne’er-do-well who’s in juvie and A-Hao (Xu Guang-Han) is the do-well studying for his med-school entrance exam. Life happens to them. A lot of life. The end? Of course not. Clean beginnings and endings are fallacies, and we catch this family smack in the thick of domestic struggle.

The film begins with Chen, whose upbeat seize-the-day philosophy contrasts with the bubbling anger inside him. He essentially disowns A-Ho when his delinquency turns disturbingly violent (illustrated in one hell of a doozy of an opening sequence), going so far as to ask the judge to throw the book at the teen so lessons will be learned. It’s pretty clear that A-Hao is his favorite, which angers Qin; she presses her husband to say when he’s actually helped his wayward youngest son, and he has no answer.    [FULL  STORY]