Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/01/09
By: Elaine Hou and Evelyn Kao

Taipei, Jan. 9 (CNA) Taiwan Panorama, a monthly magazine published by the Ministry of

Foreign Affairs (MOFA) that offers international readers in-depth insights into Taiwanese society and culture is still being published, the ministry said Tuesday.

The ministry was clarifying a newspaper advertisement dated Jan. 5, which was placed on the front page of Tuesday’s United Daily News, stating that the quarterly journal Kuang Hua (phonetically similar to the monthly magazine’s Chinese name) has been suspended due to the chief editor’s advanced age of 85.

The quarterly journal mentioned in the advertisement is not Taiwan Panorama published by MOFA’s Department of International Information Services, said Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrew Lee (李憲章).    [FULL  STORY]

‘LEGAL WARFARE’: The launching of the M503 route has made it more difficult to discern military aircraft from passengers jets and has reduced Taiwan’s response time

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 10, 2018
By: Chen Wei-han  /  Staff reporter

China’s move to launch northbound commercial flights on the M503 route compromises

the integrity of Taiwan’s airspace, and the nation should reduce cross-strait flights to force negotiations with China while increasing its defense budget and develop asymmetric defense capabilities, academics said yesterday.

China on Thursday last week unilaterally announced the launch of the M503 route, which is 7.8km from the median line of the Taiwan Strait, as well as three extension routes — W121, W122 and W123 — along the southeast coast of China.

China first introduced the M503 route in January 2015 to ease congestion in a nearby route, but its implications on Taiwan’s air defense resulted in one of the most notable cross-strait confrontations of former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) term.

Following negotiations, southbound flights on the M503 route were launched in March 2015.    [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 2018-01-08

The 2018 Taiwan Lantern Festival is set to kick off in Chiayi County on February 16, the

first day of the Lunar New Year. In keeping with tradition, this year’s theme lantern will feature a dog, which is the Chinese zodiac sign for this year.

The name of the theme lantern is “loyalty and integrity,” which reflects the concept that the dog is man’s best friend. The theme lantern will be unveiled to the public on the Lantern Festival, which takes place this year on March 2.

The theme lantern is 21 meters in height and features recyclable refraction sheets which enable more than 70% of the light to penetrate through the surface of the lantern.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan’s sandbox bill commanded bipartisan support but achieving it was no easy task.

The News Lens
Date: 2018/01/08
By: David Green

After a year that saw Taiwan’s parliament deeply divided on issues including pension

reform, labor rights and transitional justice, 2017 ended on a rare note of unity in Taiwan’s parliament. On Dec. 29, the Legislative Yuan voted to pass the final reading of the Financial Technology Innovation Experimentation Act, with the bill commanding cross-party support.

The Act offers the most innovative companies in the fintech space the chance to experiment in a regulatory “sandbox” for up to three years without falling foul of existing laws or regulations. Since discussions on its composition began, it has been viewed as a key indicator of Taiwan’s willingness to embrace a more flexible regulatory approach, and has been championed as a means of both attracting international talent and providing graduates with the inspiration and opportunity to remain in Taiwan.

The News Lens sat down with Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislator Karen Yu (余宛如), who as a member of the Finance Committee was in large part responsible for initiating and supporting the bill, to talk about conflicts over credit for the bill, its origins and wider efforts to promote Taiwan’s innovation economy.    [FULL  STORY]

The USS Wasp is an amphibious assault ship capable of housing F-35B stealth fighters

Taiwan News 
Date: 2018/01/08
By: Duncan DeAeth, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – The USS Wasp entered the theater of operations for the US

Navy’s 7th Fleet on Jan. 6.

The USS Wasp is an amphibious assault ship that is essentially a compact sized aircraft carrier. It recently completed two months in the Caribbean Sea assisting with relief work.

It is capable of acting as a platform for the advanced F-35B stealth fighters, which are expected to be loaded on to the carrier at the Marine corps Air Station in Yamaguchi Prefecture, reports Japan Times.

.The Wasp departed Norfolk Virginia on Aug. 30 to join the 7th fleet that is headquartered in Yokosuka, Japan. It transited through the Strait of Magellan in late December, and stopped briefly at Pearl Harbor over the New Year, reports MarineLink.
[FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/01/08
By: Emerson Lim and Ko Lin

Manila, Jan. 8 (CNA) Taiwan will provide humanitarian aid to the Philippines to help

Marawi City recover from a five-month armed conflict that ended late last year, the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in the Philippines said on Monday.

Collaborating with the Buddhist Compassion Relief Tzu Chi Foundation, the office will mount a relief effort that will include 10,780 tons of rice and 400 makeshift homes, Taiwan’s representative to the Philippines Gary Song-huann Lin (林松煥) said.

The batches of rice are expected to first arrive in the city of Iligan in Mindanao later this month, where local authorities will help with the logistics to distribute the aid to the people, Lin said.    [FULL  STORY]

LABORIOUS DISCUSSIONS: The withdrawal means that the Cabinet’s proposed amendments will have to be voted on during the plenary session with few changes

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 09, 2018
By: Chen Wei-han  /  Staff reporter

The New Power Party (NPP) yesterday unexpectedly withdrew from what had been a

fairly smooth cross-caucus negotiation effort on the Cabinet’s proposed amendments to the Labor Standards Act (勞動基準法).

Following more than 50 hours of hunger strike by NPP lawmakers in front of the Presidential Office Building in Taipei against the Cabinet’s proposals, the NPP submitted draft amendments that were more or less in line with the Cabinet’s.

The NPP agreed to raise the maximum number of consecutive working days from six to 12 and conditionally lower the minimum rest time between shifts from 11 hours to eight, but added a mechanism that would allow individual employees to refuse to work overtime.

According to the NPP’s new proposals, businesses seeking to raise the maximum number of consecutive working days and lower the rest time between shifts would have to seek approval from its supervising agencies, the Ministry of Labor and the Legislative Yuan as well the respective unions.    [FULL  STORY]

Compared to other issues such as air pollution or food safety, the environmental impact of textile waste has long been ignored

Taiwan News 
Date: 2018/01/07
By: Teng Pei-ju, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Mass production and consumption in the textile industry have

made clothes easily disposable, and in Taiwan, it is estimated that 438 pieces of clothing are thrown away every minute.

A report published by the Global Views Monthly quoted Tang Chien-hsiung (湯劍雄), who runs a textile recycling business, as saying that on average 72,000 tons of garments are ditched every year by Taiwanese people.

Tang said if one kilogram of recycled garments was constituted 3.2 pieces of clothing, then approximately 230 million pieces annually or 438 pieces per minute are discarded in the country.

Other reports, such as one from the Epoch Times, also suggest that at least 60,000 tons of apparel are recycled on an annual basis on the island.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2018/01/07
By: Wu Hsin-yun and William Yen

Taipei, Jan. 7 (CNA) More than 54 percent of people in Taiwan are in favor of the

proposed amendments to the Labor Standards Act, which deal mainly with work hours and time off, according to a survey published Sunday by Win Win Weekly magazine.

The poll showed that 54.2 percent of the public thinks the labor laws need to be amended, while 88.6 percent would like the law to be based on the needs of the various industries, with the relevant authorities setting special regulations.

On the issue of a proposal of allow deferment of special leave for up to one year, 76.7 percent of people in Taiwan support it, and among people aged 20-29, the support rate is 81.1 percent, according to the poll.    [FULL  STORY]