Building man claimed had ‘collapsed’ was actually Kaohsiung Port Terminal construction project

Taiwan News
Date: 2018/12/08
By: Keoni Everington, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — A Taiwanese netizen now faces charges after he started a false rumor on Thursday (Dec. 6) that a building at the Port of Kaohsiung had collapsed, reported UDN.

On Thursday, a 34-year-old netizen, identified as Fan Chiang (范姜), posted a message on the Facebook group Breaking News Commune (爆料公社) showing images of a steel structure seemingly bent and lying on the ground with the text “The Port Service Tower has collapsed on the seaside road.” Many netizens soon believed that an accident occurred, but after local media verified with the Kaohsiung Fire Department and the Lingya Precinct of the Kaohsiung Police department that no accidents occurred, a search began to find the source of the rumor.

Kaohsiung Port Police found that the netizen lived in New Taipei City and the Sanxia Precinct of the New Taipei City Police Department coordinated with them to track down the person responsible for the post. Sanxia District police traced the post to Fan Chiang, a resident of New Taipei City’s Yingge District, and at 10 a.m. yesterday (Dec. 7) he went into the police station for questioning.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/12/08
By: Jiang Chin-yeh and Frances Huang 

Taipei, Dec. 8 (CNA) Taiwan has had a ban in place for the past five years on the use of core telecommunications equipment manufactured by Chinese companies, the National Communications Commission (NCC) said Saturday, in response to a recent foreign magazine report on the likelihood of the risks posed by such equipment within Taiwan.

NCC deputy chief Wong Po-tsung (翁柏宗) said that in 2013, when the NCC was issuing 4G licenses, it stipulated that operators were not permitted to use core telecom network or base station equipment from China.

The decision was made after prudent assessment of the national and information security risks, in light of the sophistication of the 4G cellular network technology, Wong said. He said the restriction remains in place, therefore, there is no need for concern about breaches of security in Taiwan as a result of telecom equipment.    [FULL  STORY]

At Taiwan’s annual Golden Pin Design Award forum, four renowned designers offered a checklist for using design to build sustainable societies.

The News Lens
Date: 2018/12/07
By: Kate Nicholson

Each year since 2014, Taiwan’s premier design competition, the Golden Pin Design Award, has invited a handful of top international designers to Taiwan to participate as jury members in the competition’s final selection process, and to share their knowledge with local audiences in the annual Golden Pin forum.

This year, in late November, speakers and audience members alike eagerly gathered under the industrial roof beams of a performance hall in Taipei’s Songshan Cultural and Creative Park.

Taking the stage in 2018: Dutch designer and visionary Ad van Berlo; Kashiwa Sato, Creative Director of Japanese design firm SAMURAI Inc.; U.S. based Edmond Bakos, Managing Director and Partner of luxury architecture and interiors firm Champalimaud Design; and Chris Lee, Founder and Creative Director of multidisciplinary studio Asylum in Singapore.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the four invited speakers took disparate approaches to the theme of the event-design and social responsibility. However, underlying currents of similarity pointed to trends of import for today’s design industry: countering today’s culture of disposable building design, the need for more holistic design practices that work across private and public sector, and an openness to collaborate to inspire innovation.
[FULL  STORY]

Taiwan MOI drafting amendment to add transparency and limit foreign purchase of political advertising

Taiwan News
Date: 2018/12/07
By: Scott Morgan, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – Taiwan’s Ministry of the Interior (MOI) will draft an amendment to ban the media from publishing advertisements paid for by foreign interests, in a bid to quell foreign influence on Taiwanese elections, reported CNA.

The proposed amendment hopes to alter the Presidential and Vice Presidential Election and Recall Act, and will also call for greater transparency to domestic funding of political advertisements.

The amendment is inspired by the U.S. Honest Ads Act, which was introduced in Oct. 2017 to regulate online advertisements, in response to foreign spending during the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

The MOI suggested that media companies could be fined between NT$200,000 (US$6,480) and NT$10 million, or double the price of advertising, if found to have run material paid for by foreign interests.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/12/07
By: Liu Chien-pang, Hsiao Po-wen and Elizabeth Hsu 

Taipei, Dec. 7 (CNA) Taiwanese film director Doze Niu (鈕承澤) was questioned at a police station in Taipei on Friday morning after he was accused of sexually assaulting a female worker on the set of a new film he is shooting.

Surrounded by reporters after giving his side of the story to police officers at Da’an Precinct, Niu said he would cooperate with the investigation by police and prosecutors and hoped that he would be judged fairly.

The director complained, however, that he has already been tried in the court of public opinion outside the judicial system.

“I’ve been sentenced to the death penalty. Doze Niu is already dead,” he said of how the public has perceived the case.    [FULL  STORY]

CLOSING LOOPHOLES: Amendments state that schools must provide perpetrators with regular counseling, but are also able to dismiss them or terminate their contracts

Taipei Times
Date: Dec 08, 2018
By: Sean Lin  /  Staff reporter

The Legislative Yuan yesterday passed amendments to the Gender Equality Education

Act (性別平等教育法), including one that would require principals, presidents, faculty members or school employees who are found to have sexually harassed students or other school personnel, but refuse to apologize to the victim or take eight hours of gender equality classes, to face a fine of up to NT$50,000.

Until now, aside from giving demerits or warnings, schools had the right to order the perpetrator to apologize to the victim, take eight hours of gender equality classes or subject them to other educational measures, after obtaining the consent of the victim or their proxies.

The new rule stipulates that perpetrators who refuse to comply with measures prescribed by their school or refuse to cooperate with the school’s gender equality education committee in its investigation would be fined between NT$10,000 and NT$50,000, and could be repeatedly fined until they comply.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan voted to reverse a plan to phase out nuclear power by 2025, but nobody knows what comes next.

The News Lens
Date: 2018/12/06
By: Brian Hioe

After the referendum on nuclear energy held concurrently with nine-in-one elections on Nov. 24, shifts in Taiwan’s treatment of nuclear energy-related issues are likely to take place. The referendum called for the overturning of current provisions in the law which stipulate that Taiwan is to be nuclear-free by 2025.

Although the administration of President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) scheduled the restart of the No. 1 reactor at the Kuosheng Nuclear Power Plant shortly after the referendum, this was not because of the results. The Tsai administration quietly approved reactor restarts for nuclear reactors, including the Kuosheng Nuclear Power Plant, last year, but the No. 1 Kuosheng Reactor was taken offline for scheduled maintenance last month. With the completion of this maintenance and the completion of safety checks after some initial failures, the plant was brought back online.

In the meantime, the first reactor of the Jinshan power plant has now reached its scheduled decommissioning date, but questions remain on what to do with the nuclear waste from the plant. The second reactor of the plant is scheduled to be decommissioned next year. On the other hand, the Ministry of Economic Affairs has ordered Taipower to submit a request to postpone the decommissioning of the Ma-Anshan Nuclear Power Plant.

It is also a question as to what should be done with nuclear rods from the currently shuttered Gongliao Nuclear Reactor, with the proposal that these rods should be shipped back to the U.S., but also calls from nuclear energy proponents to restart the reactor.
[FULL  STORY]

Further analysis showed that the most common risk factor for new HIV infections this year was unprotected sex (92%)

Taiwan News
Date: 2018/12/06
By: George Liao, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan Centers for Disease Control (Taiwan CDC) said in a news release on Nov. 30 that as of Nov. 29 this year, the number of AIDS infections in Taiwan was 37,747, of which 1,819 were new diagnoses, showing a decline of 21% (a drop of 497 new patients) compared with the same period of last year.

Taiwan CDC said the decrease in the number of new HIV infections was the second decline since 2006.

According to the news release, further analysis of data showed that the most common risk factor for new HIV infections this year was unprotected sex, at an alarming 92%.

With regard to which age groups are more at risk for HIV infection, the agency said an estimated 45% of people diagnosed with HIV were aged 25 to 34, followed by those aged 15-24 (25%). However, the numbers of HIV infections of both groups have reduced by 24% year over year, the agency added.    [FULL  STORY]