Taiwan News
Date: 2017/01/11
By: Christopher Bodeen, Associated Press, Associated Press

BEIJING (AP) — China said Wednesday it was committed to promoting peace and stability in Asia, even

as it sent an aircraft carrier battle group through the Taiwan Strait amid heightened tensions between Beijing and the self-ruled island.

The statement in the preface to a Cabinet report on China’s policies on Asia-Pacific security cooperation follows heated criticism from the U.S., Japan and others over Beijing’s increasingly robust assertions of its maritime claims, particularly in the South China Sea.

The report made no direct reference to such concerns while casting Beijing as a force for economic development and conflict reduction.

“China is committed to promoting peace and stability in this region. It follows the path of peaceful development and the mutually beneficial strategy of opening up,” the report said.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2017/01/11
By: Huang Li-yun and Ko Lin

Taipei, Jan. 11 (CNA) Taiwan’s Legislature passed an amendment to the Electricity Act on Wednesday, allowing for the supply of green energy directly to consumers and the restructuring of the state-owned Taiwan Power Company (Taipower).

The new law changes the regulation that permitted green energy suppliers to sell electricity only to Taipower and is expected to spur more rapid development of the sector, which currently produces only 4 percent of the electricity generated in Taiwan.

Other suppliers of conventional power will also be allowed to sell electricity directly to consumers, ending Taipower’s 70 years of monopoly, according to the amended law.

It also allows for Taipower’s operations to be split into two sectors, one for power generation and the other for electricity transmission, distribution and sale.    [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date: January 12, 2017
By: CNA

CNA — The Republic of Chona (R.O.C.) Marine’s “frogmen” trainees crawl on rough stones down the so-called “Road to Heaven,” the last test before completing their training at a R.O.C. Navy base in Kaohsiung Friday, Jan. 11, as their trainers and families look on. The “frogmen” of the Amphibious Reconnaissance and Patrol Unit are considered one of the elite forces of the R.O.C. military.   [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan Today
Date: January 10, 2017

Construction of National Taiwan University Hospital’s branch at the Hsinchu Biomedical Science Park

officially began Jan. 7 in northern Taiwan’s Hsinchu City.

The 728-bed hospital will be built in two stages, with the first scheduled to start operations in 2020, and the second in 2022. From the outset the branch will feature intensive care facilities, while over time adding technologies to enable services like long-distance heath care.

“Taiwan has encountered bottlenecks in developing its economy and must therefore undergo structural transformations,” Premier Lin Chuan said at the groundbreaking ceremony.

The new addition to the science park is also expected to act as a major medical research center. “It is imperative that the nation work to develop sectors featuring high value-added jobs,” he added. “The innovation-oriented, high value-added biomedical industry is just such a sector.”    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2017/01/10
By: Chen Huei-jen and Ko Lin

Taipei, Jan. 10 (CNA) Taiwan signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Saint Lucia Monday on cooperation in the battle against money laundering, the funding of terrorism and other major forms of financial crime.

The MOU was signed by Financial Intelligence Authority Director Paul Thompson on behalf of the Saint Lucia government in a ceremony held at the Embassy of the Republic of China (Taiwan) in the Caribbean country. The finalization of the MOU, witnessed by ROC Ambassador Ray Mou (牟華瑋), went into effect January 9, 2017.

The MOU was pre-signed by Lee Hung-jin (李宏錦), head of Taiwan’s Anti-Money Laundering Division under the Investigation Bureau, on November 22 last year. The copy of the agreement was then sent to the ROC Embassy to be finalized by the Saint Lucian counterparts.

“This memorandum marks a milestone for Taiwan-Saint Lucia bilateral cooperation on countering cross-border money laundering,” Mou said, adding that the pact signaled a good beginning to 2017.    [FULL  STORY]

The China Post
Date: January 11, 2017
By: Christine Chou

The government on Tuesday denied claims from the head of a business group that it planned to extend

the maximum limit for overtime work.

President of the Manufactures United General Association of Industrial Park (MUGA, 工業區) Qin Jia-hong (秦嘉鴻) told local media Tuesday that President Tsai Ing-wen and Premier Lin Chuan (林全) “had personally assured him” of a future increase from 46 to 52 hours per month.

But Cabinet spokesman Hsu Kuo-yung (徐國勇) said Tuesday that the government had “no such plans,” adding the government would “not make any U-turns.”

Hsu said a flexible working hour policy applied to some occupations, such as department store staff during anniversary sale season who may work up to a consecutive 10 or 12 days.

But he stressed that such staff “must take their entitled days off.”    [FULL  STORY]

The News Lens
Date: 2017/01/09

Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on Sunday met with Texas Senator Ted Cruz and Texas

Governor Greg Abbot, despite China reportedly sending a message to the U.S. lawmakers urging them not to meet Tsai, CNA reports. Tsai was making a stop in Houston en route to Central America for diplomatic visits when Ted Cruz visited Tsai at her hotel for a brief meeting. Cruz told the media after the meeting that he, along with other Texas senators, have received letters from Beijing prior to the meeting asking them not to meet Tsai to uphold the “one-China policy.” Cruz said the letter was, however, unpersuasive.

“The People’s Republic of China needs to understand that in America we make decisions about meeting with visitors for ourselves,” Cruz said in a statement on Sunday.    [FULL  STORY]

Enigmatic veteran who spent a lifetime building a house from discarded materials has died inside his creation

Taiwan News
Date: 2017/01/09
By: Keoni Everington, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

Taipei (Taiwan News) — They say a man’s home is his castle, and in this case a mysterious old man, who

had become a local legend for spending decades constructing his curious citadel, lived his last hours in his handcrafted fortress of solitude.

Located at No. 1 Chung Cheng Road in the Taitung City Waterfront Park, stands a strange structure that locals say an elderly man, known only by his surname of Lee, has spent at least 30 years building up and patching using abandoned materials that he’s scavenged, such as wood, bricks, and glass. The four-story patchwork of assorted waste materials has been dubbed by locals as “Taitung’s Moving Castle” after the anime film “Howl’s Moving Castle” directed by Hayao Miyasaki and the novel by the same name written by British author Diana Wynne Jones. It is also known as the “White Hovel” for its pure white exterior.

As to how and why he built the house, the definitive answer remains unknown as he was hearing impaired and inarticulate in his later years. What is known is that the house consists of four floors, with Lee dwelling primarily on the second floor, while he grew vegetables on the third floor.   [FULL  STORY]