Thu, May 16, 2024
Taiwan is open to dialogue with China, president-elect William Lai (賴清德) told the Copenhagen Democracy Summit on Tuesday, just days before he is to take office.“I will not rule out dialogue with China on the principles of mutual respect, mutual benefits and dignity,” Lai said in a prerecorded video,
‘TOO LATE’: Yu Pei-chen, a Taoyuan councilor and ex-army general, said the Chinese officials were 41 years late in imposing sanctions on him, as he enlisted in 1983 China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) yesterday announced sanctions against five Taiwanese politicians, pundits and public figures critical of Beijing, accusing them of spreading disinformation about China.The five are: Liu Bao-jie (劉寶傑), Lee Zheng-hao (李正皓), Wang Yi-chuan (王義川), Yu Pei-chen (于北辰), Hu
If the WHO is serious about its goal of “Health for All,” it would allow Taiwan to attend all of its meetings, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said yesterday.Taiwan is excluded from most international organizations because of objections by China.The WHO’s director-general should take the
The US is to send a delegation of former officials to Taiwan next week for the inauguration of president-elect William Lai (賴清德), a US official said, warning China against any retaliation. The team attending the ceremony on Monday includes US President Joe Biden’s former National Economic Council di
About 100 rights advocates and fishers, along with journalists, yesterday set sail for a disputed shoal in the South China Sea, while China Coast Guard vessels began shadowing the flotilla.The Philippine Coast Guard deployed three patrol ships and a light plane to keep watch from a distance.The flot
Singapore yesterday swore in Lawrence Wong (黃循財) as the city-state’s new prime minister in a ceremony broadcast live on television after Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) stepped down following two decades in office.Wong, formerly deputy prime minister, was inaugurated at the Istana government office shortly af
BASIC OPERATIONS: About half a dozen navy ships from both countries took part in the days-long exercise based on the Code for Unplanned Encounters at Sea An unpublicized joint military exercise between Taiwan and the US in the Pacific Ocean last month was carried out in accordance with an international code, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said yesterday.According to a Reuters report citing four unnamed sources, the two nations’ navies last mo
PRECAUTIONS: Getting vaccinated is an effective way to prevent infections, and people should also take measures to avoid mosquito bites, the CDC said The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported this year’s first two cases of Japanese encephalitis, including a person who died nine days after showing symptoms, and urged people to take precautionary measures against mosquito bites.One of the cases is a man in his 60s, who lived in Kaohs
The National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) on Tuesday announced that it has launched a global competition with a US$30,000 prize focused on “IC [integrated circuit] design innovations” and “chip-based innovative applications.”The competition, named the IC Taiwan Grand Challenge, is being hel
The average daily rate of licensed hotels in Taiwan moved higher by about 3.4 percent from a year earlier in the first quarter of this year, according to the Tourism Administration, which cited inflation as the reason for the increase. Data released by the agency on Tuesday showed the average daily
ASSESSMENT: Having next generation sequencing covered by the National Health Insurance would enable doctors to make better decisions, a physician said About 20,000 people with cancer per year would benefit from more advanced next generation sequencing (NGS) covered by the National Health Insurance (NHI) system, the National Health Research Institutes said on Tuesday.Testing for cancer, which has long been the leading cause of death in the nation,
National Taiwan University Hospital yesterday said that its novel method of hysteroscopic metroplasty has simplified the surgical procedure for people with a septate uterus and increased the success rate.A septate uterus — the most common congenital uterine anomaly — is a condition in which a thin t
PAYING TRIBUTE: Decked out in a dress in her signature yellow color, Nymphia called President Tsai ‘Taiwan’s mother’ for her contributions to gender equality Nymphia Wind encourages young Taiwanese to “be fearless and true to themselves,” President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said yesterday, following a performance by the drag queen at the Presidential Office in Taipei.Nymphia, 28, last month became the first Taiwanese and first East Asian to be crowned the “Next
An international alliance of parliamentarians is to hold its annual summit in Taipei in July, bringing legislators from more than 20 countries to Taiwan, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said on Tuesday.In a pre-recorded clip aired during the Copenhagen Democracy Summit, Wu announced that
BARRIERS: Lai would never accept Beijing’s ‘one China’ principle, and would base his approach to cross-strait relations on Taiwanese sovereignty, an expert said The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is setting political thresholds that would hinder, if not make impossible, efforts by incoming president William Lai’s (賴清德) administration to initiate dialogue with China, experts said yesterday.Citing comments by China’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokesman Chen Binhua
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators are bypassing established procedures to push through a package of bills that would expand lawmakers’ powers, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus members said yesterday.The group of bills — which would make “contempt of the legislature” a punishable o
BEHEMOTH: MSCI said that it would lower the weighting of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co by 0.2 percentage points to 47.77 percent given its steep rally Global index provider MSCI Inc yesterday announced that it would raise Taiwan’s weighting in two of its major indices and trim it in another one following a quarterly index review.The company would increase Taiwan’s weighting by 0.01 percentage points to 1.74 percent in the MSCI All Country World In
ASML Holding NV’s new advanced chip machines have a daunting price tag, said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), one of the Dutch company’s biggest clients.“The cost is very high,” TSMC senior vice president Kevin Zhang (張曉強) said at a technology symposium in Amsterdam on Tuesday, ref
Quanta Computer Inc (廣達電腦), one of the world’s leading contract notebook computer makers, yesterday reported an 86.4 percent annual increase in net profit for the first quarter despite weak seasonality for technology products during the period.The firm — an assembler of Apple Inc’s MacBooks — also m
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is attempting to create an alternative international world order to the US-dominated model. China has benefited hugely from the current order since former Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平) opened up its economy five decades ago.Countries can be categorized as cont
During President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) eight years in office, she has perhaps done more for the armed forces and sports than any other president in the nation’s history, and these are also things that president-elect William Lai (賴清德) has supported for many years, so he can be expected to be at least
As Ukraine leads the global fight for democracy, Taiwan, facing a potential war with China, should draw lessons from Ukraine’s cyberwarfare success. Taiwan has been enhancing its arsenal with advanced weapons from the West in anticipation of a possible full-scale invasion. However, Taipei should als
LOCAL RIVALRY: Thousands of Spurs fans chanted: ‘Are you watching Arsenal,’ as Haaland scored the first of his two goals, taking City two points clear of the Gunners Erling Haaland scored twice on Tuesday to settle Manchester City’s nerves as the English Premier League champions beat Tottenham Hotspur 2-0 to take a giant step toward a historic fourth straight English title.The Norwegian forward tapped home a pinpoint Kevin de Bruyne cross early in the second hal
Andre de Grasse, the reigning Olympic champion in the men’s 200m, and many other top-class international athletes are to showcase their talent in Taipei at the Taiwan Athletics Open early next month, according to the event’s official Web site.The Canadian sprinter, who clocked 19.62 seconds to top t
Daniil Medvedev’s Internazionali BNL d’Italia title defense came to an early end on Tuesday after the world No. 4 was knocked out at the last-16 stage by Tommy Paul, while Iga Swiatek cruised into the women’s semi-finals in Rome.Second seed Medvedev has never successfully defended an ATP Tour crown
Women’s basketball sensation Caitlin Clark scored 20 points, but gave up 10 turnovers on a tough WNBA debut as her Indiana Fever team fell to a 92-71 loss to the Connecticut Sun on Tuesday.Clark, NCAA Division I basketball’s all-time leading scorer, has brought unprecedented attention to women’s bas
STREET BATTLES: The High Commissioner said that ‘numerous arsons and pillaging of shops, infrastructure and public buildings,’ including schools, had been carried out Two people were killed and hundreds injured, shops were looted and public buildings torched during a second night of rioting in New Caledonia, authorities said yesterday, as anger over constitutional reforms from Paris boiled over.What began as pro-independence demonstrations has spiraled into three
FOREIGN INFLUENCE: The European Council president said that if Georgians want to join the EU, they have to respect the fundamental principles of the rule of law Protesters blocked streets in the capital of Georgia and milled angrily outside the parliament building after lawmakers on Tuesday approved a “foreign influence” bill that critics call a Russian-style threat to free speech and the country’s aspirations to join the EU.Soon after the 84-30 vote, a cro
The administration of US President Joe Biden has told key lawmakers that it would send more than US$1 billion in additional arms and ammunition to Israel, three congressional aides said on Tuesday.It was not immediately known how soon the weapons would be delivered.It is the first arms shipment to I
If the old city walls could talk, Tainan would tell a tumultuous tale of 17th-century Dutch forts, ornate Qing Dynasty temples and Japanese colonial opulence. Incense smoke lingers thick in the air as colorful parades weave through cobbled alleyways; here the spiritual realm remains inextricable fro
Last week a video showing 60-year-old Peter Abbott screaming abuse at TV producer Samantha Isaacs gained a viral audience, after Abbott was found guilty at Poole magistrates court of “using threatening words or behavior to cause alarm, distress or fear of violence.”In the phone-filmed video, Abbott
Throughout the 500-plus pages of Dorian Lynskey’s overview of the art and literature of the end of the world, terrible things are done to the Earth. It is frozen, boiled, irradiated and desiccated. It is bombarded by asteroids, comets and rogue planets; volcanoes and earthquakes destroy it from with
A: The hit Korean drama “Queen of Tears” is so popular.B: What’s it about?A: The story depicts the marriage between a man and the daughter of an extremely rich family.B: What a lucky man he is.A: Well, not necessarily. The leading actor Kim Soo-hyun even cries 40 times in the series, showing th
When the world’s top gas traders met late last month at a canal-side hotel on the outskirts of Amsterdam, the atmosphere was business-as-usual: coffee, croissants and wrangling over deals for the upcoming winter. Then came news of a leak at Europe’s biggest liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant, located
These are crazy times. Biblical disturbances in nature, such as the repeated torrential rain in Dubai or the mass fish die-off in Vietnam’s overheated reservoir, seem to mirror our overheated politics and social environment.At such moments, it is crucial to keep a cool head and analyze all the weird
It’s certainly been a pleasure watching the presidential campaign launch of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidate Hou You-yi (侯友宜) lurch painfully about like a wounded pachyderm in search of an elephant graveyard. Hou’s fall to third place in some polls last week appears early, and it might still be recoverable. But grumbling in his party about replacing him has already begun. Indeed, all indications are that the party that twice gave us Lien Chan (連戰), the most despised politician in Taiwan, as a presidential candidate and later offered voters Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) and Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), is arcing along its normal descending trajectory, the North Korean missile test of electoral politics. A KIND OF POLICY PLATFORM Last week the KMT doubled down on this path with Hou’s calls for nuclear power and more death penalty executions, standard KMT fare for decades (the latter is unnecessary since so many potential criminals are likely to die in traffic accidents long before they harm anyone). Apparently KMT policy institutions are not echo chambers so much as mausoleums where dead ideas are embalmed and then periodically put on display. The lack of public policy imagination is obvious. A less obvious facet of KMT ineptitude: with years of speculation that Hou would be their man in 2024, neither Hou nor the party insisted on interesting or experimental public policies to showcase Hou’s greatness in preparation for the showdown. Of course, that is even more true of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Hou’s slide and the media buzz surrounding it are obscuring the truly urgent problem the pro-Taiwan side faces: DPP presidential candidate William Lai (賴清德) has not expanded his voter support beyond the party base. In most polls he remains below 40 percent. Independent voters are staying away in droves, and for the moment the young are turning to
July 17 to July 23 When Yeh Ken-chuang (葉根壯) came of age, the traditional skills of architecture and carpentry that had been in his family for four generations were disappearing. After helping his uncle Yeh Teh-ling (葉得令) construct ships, residences and temples for more than a decade, Yeh struck out on his own at the age of 28 in 1960 as a damusi (大木司, chief carpenter), earning his lifelong title “Chief Chuang” (壯司). Around this time, builders in his homeland of Penghu were increasingly using reinforced concrete instead of wood, due to the humid climate. The period also saw a frenzy in temple construction as the economy improved, meaning there was plenty of work for Yeh. Adept in non-structural techniques such as doors, windows and furniture, as well as the intricate carvings and detailed decorations that adorned the structures, Yeh was able to adapt his skills, leading the reconstruction of the historic Hsiliao Daitian Temple (西寮代天宮) on Penghu’s main island in 1963. According to the book Crossing Traditions in Yeh Ken-chuang’s Large-scale Carpentry Skills (宮廟巧藝 :跨越傳統的葉根壯大木作技術), it was Penghu’s first temple that used a purely reinforced concrete structure. Before his life was cut short, Yeh created more than 70 temples and related structures across the various islands of Penghu and left behind more than 230 building plans. Although Yeh could have built temples and other structures on Taiwan proper, he only worked on a handful of projects outside of Penghu because he wanted to be close to his family. CLAN OF CARPENTERS The Yeh family’s woodworking tradition began with Yeh Ma-li (葉媽利), who learned the architecture and carpentry trade from an unknown master on Kinmen. The Yehs trace their roots to Kinmen, although this branch had been living in Penghu since the early 1600s. Yeh Ma-li was Penghu’s chief temple builder between 1860 and
New Taipei City | 14-23 | 10% | |
Hsinchu County | 14-22 | 10% | |
Hsinchu City | 14-22 | 10% | |
Taipei City | 14-22 | 10% | |
Miaoli County | 12-22 | 10% | |
Taoyuan City | 14-22 | 10% | |
Keelung City | 15-21 | 10% |
Yunlin County | 14-24 | 0% | |
Taichung City | 14-24 | 0% | |
Nantou County | 14-24 | 0% | |
Changhua County | 14-23 | 0% |
Chiayi County | 13-24 | 0% | |
Chiayi City | 14-25 | 0% | |
Tainan City | 15-22 | 0% | |
Kaohsiung City | 17-23 | 0% | |
Pingtung County | 16-25 | 0% |
Yilan County | 14-22 | 10% | |
Hualien County | 16-22 | 10% | |
Taitung County | 17-23 | 10% |
Kinmen County | 11-18 | 0% | |
Penghu County | 17-20 | 0% | |
Lienchiang County | 10-13 | 10% |