Taitung heat follows 124-year record high for Taipei City one day earlier

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/07/25
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — A temperature of 40.2 degrees Celsius was registered in the Taitung County town of Dawu on Saturday (July 25) at noon, equaling a Taiwanese record from 2004 set in the same area.

The sweltering heat came less than a day after Taipei City set a 124-year record of 39.7 C, according to the Central Weather Bureau.    [FUILL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 07/25/2020
By: Yu Hsiang and Matthew Mazzetta

Taipei, July 25 (CNA) The opposition Kuomintang (KMT) on Saturday reiterated that it will continue to throw its full weight behind Li Mei-jhen (李眉蓁), its candidate in the upcoming Kaohsiung mayoral by-election, two days after she said she was "renouncing" her graduate degree amid accusations that she had plagiarized her thesis.

At a press conference Saturday, Wang Yu-min (王育敏), head of the KMT's Culture and Communications Committee, denied reports that KMT members with backgrounds in academia and others had been calling on the party's leaders to cut ties with Li.

"The KMT leadership continues to support Li's candidacy, and the party is united in its efforts to get her elected and consolidate the support of KMT voters," Wang said.

For instance, KMT Chairman Johnny Chiang (江啟臣) will attend Li's campaign rally on Saturday, as scheduled, and none of her other campaign activities with elected KMT officials in Kaohsiung have been canceled, Wang said.    [FULL  STORY]

ON THE RISE: Emergency-room visits for heat-related illness this year have jumped 40 percent to 1,722 visits from 1,248 visits last year, ministry data showed

Taipei Times
Date: Jul 26, 2020
By: Lee I-chia / Staff Reporter

As reports of heat illness have increased due to high temperatures across the nation, an emergency-room physician said that four types of medicines might also contribute to increased risks of heat-related illness.

Wei Chih-wei (魏智偉), director of the emergency room at Tung General Hospital in Taichung, said that as many people are traveling and enjoying outdoor activities in the summer, they should take preventive measures to minimize the risk of heat-related illness, including heatstroke and heat exhaustion.

According to Ministry of Health and Welfare data, 181 emergency rooms have reported 659 visits for heat illness from July 1 to Friday, which is 1.8 times higher than the 370 visits reported in the same period last year.

As of Friday, 1,722 emergency-room visits for heat illness have been reported this year, which is about 40 percent higher than the 1,248 visits reported in the same period last year, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said in a news release yesterday.    [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 24 July, 2020
By: Shirley Lin

Corals turning white off Taiwan's south coast[/caption] Taiwan has some of the most beautiful coral reefs in the region. But Taiwan’s reefs are struggling to survive in the face of climate change. Experts say, however, that they may have an ally in a destructive force of nature.

Taiwan justly calls itself the coral kingdom. That’s because the waters off its southern coast are dotted with colorful reefs. But climate change has sent the temperature of seawater in the area rising to about 30C, sickening and bleaching the corals. Bleaching is happening at a range of spots, from the tourist magnet of Kenting to the small island of Xiaoliuqiu off the southwest coast.

Diving coaches say that coral is turning white in shallow and deep waters alike. The coaches also said that the range affected by bleaching has grown to be larger than ever before. 
[FULL  STORY]

A second Cuban missile crisis, but in Asia.

The National Interest
Date: July 24, 2020
by Robert Farley Follow drfarls on TwitterL

Here's What You Need To Remember: Under almost any conceivable scenario, deploying U.S. GLCMs to Taiwan would be a terrible idea. In the very few scenarios where such a deployment would make sense, the diplomatic relationship between Washington and Beijing will already have decayed to such an extent that war would be virtually inevitable.

In 1962, the United States and the Soviet Union nearly turned the Cold War hot because of the Soviet decision to deploy nuclear-armed ballistic missiles to Cuba. A few years before that, China and the United States came perilously close to war over a few Taiwanese-controlled islands off the coast of the mainland.

In the next decade, as tensions grow between Beijing and Washington, and as the United States sloughs off the restrictions of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, we could see a replay of both crises. In a few years, the United States may have new ground-launched cruise missiles (GLCMs) with the capacity to strike at intermediate ranges. And if relations between China and the United States continue to deteriorate, Washington may go looking for places to station those missiles. GLCMs in Taiwan are simultaneously China’s greatest fear, and the last card that the United States can play before war begins. They would also spark the most dangerous nuclear standoff since 1962.

What Has Gone Before:

The United States has threatened China with cruise missiles before. In 1958, the United States sent several batteries of MGM-1 “Matador” cruise missiles to Taiwan. The missiles, equipped with a 40 kt nuclear weapon, could hit targets at a range of up to 1000 km, putting a significant portion of the mainland at risk. The United States

withdrew these missiles because of obsolescence in 1962, and withdrew its entire military presence in 1979 upon the normalization of diplomatic relations with the PRC.   
[FULL  STORY]

NSYSU review committee will reach verdict after a month of study by outside experts

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/07/24
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The first meeting of a review committee at National Sun Yat-sen University (NSYSU) found a high level of similarity between the master’s thesis presented by Kaohsiung Kuomintang (KMT) mayoral candidate Lee Mei-jhen (李眉蓁) and the work of others, but a final verdict will not arrive before election day, reports said Friday (July 24).

Accusations of plagiarism have dogged Lee, a member of the Kaohsiung City Council, less than a month before the August 15 by-election designed to find a successor for KMT Mayor Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), who lost a June 6 recall vote by a wide margin.

In a reaction to the allegations, Lee said she was renouncing her master’s degree from the Kaohsiung university, but the introductions of the candidates to be sent out to voters by the election commission had already been printed, so they would still mention her degree, reports said.

In its meeting Friday, the NSYSU review committee reached the conclusion that Lee’s master’s thesis showed “a high degree of similarity with the work of others,” CNA reported. The others were Lei Cheng-ju (雷政儒) from the Department of Public Administration and Policy at National Taipei University, and Tung Chen-yuan (童振源), currently minister of the Overseas Community Affairs Council.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 07/24/2020
By: Chen Yun-yu, Wu Jui-chi and
interns Grace Hu and Meryl Kao

Taipei, July 24 (CNA) A technician working at National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology in Taoyuan City has been ordered detained by the Taoyuan District Court after he was found growing marijuana in his dormitory, the military research institute said on Thursday.

The technician, identified only by his surname Hsieh (謝), has been an employee at the facility for about three years and was found suspiciously using an abnormally large amount of electricity and not turning off the lights in his dorm room in the past two months, according to the institute.

Staff there notified the Taoyuan Military Police and the Taoyuan Police Department's Longtan Precinct, which later found several marijuana plants and some equipment for use in growing the hallucinogenic drug in Hsieh's dorm on Wednesday, the institute said.

According to the police, Hsieh claimed that the marijuana was only grown for his own use, but the police are looking into whether he grew the plant to produce as drugs for selling.
[FULL  STORY]

THREE NEW IMPORTED CASES: Six COVID-19 cases this month have been imported from the Philippines, which has been reporting 1,600 new coronavirus patients per day

Taipei Times
Date: Jul 25, 2020
By: Lin Chia-nan / Staff reporter

Starting tomorrow, all travelers arriving from the Philippines must undergo COVID-19 testing at the airport, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said yesterday, as it reported three imported cases from the country.

After the tests, arrivals with symptoms should await their results at a government quarantine facility, while those without symptoms can self-isolate at home or at a quarantine hotel for the mandatory 14-day period, Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who heads the center, told a news briefing in Taipei.

Taiwanese and holders of an Alien Resident Certificate (ARC) are currently only required to undergo home isolation for 14 days after entering the nation, he said.

Foreign visitors without an ARC are required to present a report showing a negative test result obtained three days before their transit flight or entry into Taiwan, he added.   [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 22 July, 2020
By: Natalie Tso

With the COVID-19 under control within its borders, Taiwan has begun promoting domestic travel. In particular, it is looking to promote island-hopping cruises to its outlying islands.

On Wednesday, the transportation ministry held a forum with island-hopping cruises as the theme.

A new cruise ship, the Explorer Dream, has already docked in Keelung and will be taking travelers on 30 tours of Taiwan’s outlying islands. The tours start in Keelung and include visits to the Matsu, Kinmen, and Penghu islands.     [FULL  STORY]

• Unlike other flashpoints, Chinese authorities will show no flexibility and could invade if it declares independence
• The People’s Liberation Army has spent years training to retake the island, and are prepared for US intervention

South China Morning Post
Date: 22 Jul, 2020
By: Minnie Chan

This is the third in a four-part series examining the growing tensions between China and the United States and how the situation could escalate into a full-blown military conflict.  Read.  part one  and part two.

Taiwan looms large as one of the most obvious flashpoints for an armed conflict between China and the United States. Beijing has made clear it regards the island as an integral part of China and any attempt to change its status is a red line.

Unlike other areas of territorial contention, such as in the South China Sea, analysts say Beijing will show no flexibility on this issue and has not ruled out force to reunify Taiwan with the mainland.

The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) of China has been preparing for its “reunification mission” ever since Chiang Kai-shek’s defeated Nationalist forces fled to the island at the end of the civil war in 1949. The military is well aware that an invasion could prompt US intervention.

“The PLA is very clear that once a war with Taiwan breaks out, their opponent will not just be the Taiwanese military, but the US-Japan alliance and other allies in the region,” said Zhou Chenming, a researcher from the Yuan Wang, a Beijing-based military science and technology institute.    [FULL  STORY]