Japan spoke up; S Korea must, too

Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi on Friday last week became the first leader in Japan’s postwar history to publicly declare that a Chinese attack on Taiwan would threaten Japan’s survival. Based on that statement, Japan could justify exercising its right to self-defense in providing direct support to Taiwan in the event of a Taiwan contingency.

In South Korea, the tone is strikingly different. In a Time magazine interview published on May 29, then-South Korean presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung was asked whether he would help defend Taiwan if China invaded. He gave what Time called a “cryptic” response: “I will think about that answer when aliens are about to invade the Earth.”

Now as president, Lee continues to emphasize national-interest-centered pragmatic diplomacy, prioritizing maneuverability amid US-China strategic rivalry.

Some attribute Seoul’s reticence to its preoccupation with the North Korean threat. Yet Lee’s progressive government favors engagement over confrontation with Pyongyang, making the North Korea factor less decisive than many assume.

Seoul’s restraint runs deeper, rooted in a reluctance, and perhaps a willful blindness, to take sides. It avoids asking how a Taiwan conflict might pull it in — or how US forces in South Korea would respond. That silence is not prudence; it is denial, and denial in this region breeds miscalculation.

Not just Japan, but also South Korea, needs absolute deterrence in the Taiwan Strait. A Taiwan contingency would be existential for South Korea. Geographically, the capital, Seoul, lies closer to Taiwan than Tokyo. Economically, South Korea’s prosperity is inseparable from the maritime stability surrounding Taiwan. More than 90 percent of South Korea’s maritime trade volume transits the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea.

A Bloomberg Economics analysis released in January last year forecast that a war in the Taiwan Strait would slash global GDP by 10 percent — with Taiwan facing a 40 percent drop, China 16.7 percent, Japan 13.5 percent, the US 6.7 percent and South Korea 23.3 percent, the second-worst after Taiwan. Simply put, a conflict in the Strait would devastate South Korea’s economy even if it did not fire a single shot.

South Korea cannot afford to treat stability in the Taiwan Strait as a distant concern. If Seoul stays silent, it might lead Beijing to believe it could invade Taiwan without facing any response from South Korea — a contrast to Japan’s growing resolve.

Japan has drawn its line; South Korea hesitates behind ambiguity. However, geography and economics leave Seoul no room for illusion: A Taiwan contingency would be a South Korea contingency. The choice is between preparedness and peril.

Alan Jeong is a student at Georgetown University in Washington.


The average annual consumption of meat per person in Taiwan is 87.2kg, of which pork accounts for 35.6kg, or more than 40 percent, making pork the primary source of meat for Taiwan’s population, a 2023 Ministry of Agriculture food supply and demand report showed.

Meat consumption has surpassed that of grains in the past few years, and pork is the main contributor to the change. Thus, the stability of pork consumption not only affects people’s daily lives, but is also crucial to the overall security of Taiwan’s livestock industry.

For several years, Taiwan has performed exceptionally well with animal epidemic prevention. Since the foot-and-mouth disease outbreak of 1997, the nation has maintained a record of zero cases of African swine fever (ASF), for which it has repeatedly received international recognition.

That changed last month, when samples from a hog farm in Taichung’s Wuci District (梧棲) tested positive for ASF viral nucleic acid, marking Taiwan’s first confirmed case of domestic ASF infection.

The incident should serve as a reminder that even a long-standing, robust epidemic prevention system can have gaps due to delays in local reporting, monitoring and response. Thus, shortening the delays between the reporting of an outbreak and its confirmation, along with enhancing coordination between central and local authorities, are critical in strengthening Taiwan’s epidemic governance.

Taiwan introduced its traceable agricultural product (TAP) system — a framework for standardized operating procedures, specific agricultural practices and management disclosures for traceability — as early as 2003, and in 2007 enacted the Agricultural Production and Certification Act (農產品生產及驗證管理法).

The core purpose of the system, now in place for more than 20 years, is to establish a complete tracking record from farming, slaughtering, processing and transportation to retail, effectively providing every hog with a clear identification code.

In the event of an outbreak, the traceability records could promptly identify the source and flow of the infection to reduce the scope of culling required and market panic, while helping the government identify which products are safe and protect consumer rights and interests.

However, if the system remains stuck at the level of documentation and demonstration without being fully integrated into local administration processes and practical operations, it would struggle to be effective.

Last month’s ASF incident demonstrates that epidemic prevention measures are more than just culling and disinfection; they also involve information transparency, risk communication and responsible governance.

Integrating digital labels and real-time monitoring — such as using radio frequency identification or blockchain technology to record data on feed, medication, testing and transportation — could help establish a more precise network of epidemic prevention data.

The emergence of ASF, while a significant shock, presents an opportunity to upgrade the existing system. If the government could use this as a turning point to promote the widespread adoption of TAP — thereby making safety and traceability the new standard for domestically produced pork — it could restore public confidence and lay a stronger foundation for the next two decades of food safety.

Yeh Cheng-hsing is a civil servant section chief.

Translated by Kyra Gustavsen

Swine fever outbreak exposes limitations


On Sunday, 13 new urgent care centers (UCC) officially began operations across the six special municipalities. The purpose of the centers — which are open from 8am to midnight on Sundays and national holidays — is to reduce congestion in hospital emergency rooms, especially during the nine-day Lunar New Year holiday next year. It remains to be seen how effective these centers would be. For one, it is difficult for people to judge for themselves whether their condition warrants visiting a major hospital or a UCC — long-term public education and health promotions are necessary. Second, many emergency departments acknowledge

By Lin Yung-zen 林應然

EDITORIAL CARTOON


When indigenous peoples are mentioned in the context of climate change, my mind immediately goes to images of my grandmother’s roofless and flooded house, destroyed by a Category 5 hurricane and a Category 4 storm in quick succession.

I also move beyond the personal, thinking of the extreme weather swings in the Andes that are damaging agricultural production; the Maasai families in Kenya and Tanzania watching their livestock die from droughts or, increasingly, massive floods; and the communities devastated by landslides in the Philippines’ Cordillera mountains.

For indigenous peoples, climate change is more than figures and charts; it is a wound that festers, eating away at our land, resources, spirituality and culture. The extreme weather events that are growing more frequent and severe disproportionately harm our communities because we rely directly on natural ecosystems.

The decision to hold this year’s UN Climate Change Conference (COP30) in the Amazon region has raised our expectations significantly. To be sure, the road to Belem, Brazil, has not been easy. We are hopeful about the proceedings, while also approaching them with the caution and clarity that come from having taken part in climate negotiations many times before, only to be ignored.

These summits are dominated by national policymakers. Still, we have always insisted that our voices be heard — even from the margins — and would continue to do so. Our aspiration is not only to be invited to the negotiating table and given a say in decisionmaking, but to help create a collective space where everyone can participate as a valued stakeholder.

With more than 3,000 indigenous people from Africa, the Arctic, Asia, North America, Latin America and the Caribbean, the Pacific, and Eastern Europe expected to attend COP30, the Global Caucus of Indigenous Peoples on Climate Change has developed positions on the summit’s main themes. Whether discussing action on climate finance, adaptation, or mitigation, our rights to self-determination and free, prior, and informed consent concerning all matters affecting our lands, territories and resources must be recognized. These are not favors or nice-to-haves, but the essential principles of a just climate transition.

As COP30’s host, Brazil seeks to make it the “COP of implementation,” which means translating commitments into robust action: capacity and technology transfers, as well as finance that actually reaches those on the front lines of climate change.

For indigenous peoples, implementing climate policies requires direct access to predictable and sustainable finance. Instead of being forced to depend on intermediaries who leave us with crumbs, we should be trusted to manage the funds ourselves, allocating them based on our own needs, timelines and knowledge systems. The problem with climate finance is not a lack of capacity, but a lack of trust and political will.

Moreover, multilateralism — touted as the path to climate salvation — is often skewed in favor of wealthy countries and influential stakeholders. We need partners who treat us as such, rather than as beneficiaries, who recognize our governance structures, support our initiatives, conduct cultural due diligence and, above all, encourage genuine dialogue.

In debates about how to ensure a just transition, we would continue to stress that clean-energy projects must not be built at the expense of our dispossession. Without strong safeguards, the decarbonization process risks becoming yet another cycle of extractivism. Respect for indigenous peoples’ rights to land and resources must be at the heart of any climate policy.

Likewise, adaptation and mitigation must be approached holistically. We cannot continue to measure success only by carbon sequestration; we must also consider the effects of these efforts on livelihoods, mental and spiritual health, and the cultural continuity of indigenous peoples.

Governments and institutions must be held accountable at COP30 for the promises they have made over the years. Words should become tangible commitments, particularly in regard to providing indigenous peoples with direct access to finance. This would require a decisive shift in mindset: Climate action must do good, not merely avoid harm.

Indigenous peoples, when viewed from this perspective, are part of the solution. Caring for the planet is embedded in our knowledge systems — restoring a forest, protecting a lagoon, and preserving traditional seeds are everyday tasks for us. However, to carry out this work, we need real recognition and support from the international community.

Eileen Mairena Cunningham, the Indigenous Peoples Organization’s Focal Point to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, is a Miskitu indigenous woman from the Wanky Awala Kupia Territory on Nicaragua’s Caribbean coast.

Copyright: Project Syndicate

COP30 must do good,  not just avoid harm


ASEAN struggles to escape US-China squeeze

Southeast Asian nations are in a bind. While ASEAN exporters face increasing pressure from US tariffs and heightened scrutiny of transshipments, their domestic markets are increasingly being dominated by Chinese goods. Alleviating the twin pressures would require a mix of defense and offense.

On the surface, relations between the US and Southeast Asian countries are improving. US President Donald Trump’s recent participation in the US-ASEAN summit produced four trade deals, as well as agreements with Thailand and Malaysia to diversify critical minerals supply chains.

However, the US’ punitively high 40 percent tariffs on the loosely defined transshipment of Chinese goods clearly indicates that the Trump administration wants ASEAN economies to limit their participation in China-centric supply chains.

But that is a difficult task.

Southeast Asian nations are an integral part of China’s various goods supply chains, and China’s investment in the region has helped to drive the rapid growth of ASEAN exports to the US.

Additionally, the region is heavily dependent on China for services trade. Out of ASEAN’s US$25 billion services trade surplus in 2023, US$9 billion was with China alone. Some ASEAN economies, such as Thailand, are hoping to expand that surplus as Chinese tourism returns to pre-COVID-19 pandemic levels.

Antagonizing Beijing is thus clearly not in ASEAN’s best interest, but aligning more closely with the US could do just that. Chinese Premier Li Qiang (李強) recently told a regional summit that Asia needed to “close ranks” in response to “bullying” from foreign countries.

Southeast Asia also faces another trade-related problem: growing local opposition to the flood of Chinese imports.

The fact that China’s exports to ASEAN are now larger than those to the US is often pointed to by market-watchers as evidence that Beijing has mitigated the impact of US tariffs by replacing the US consumer market with ASEAN ones.

On the one hand, that is correct. While a portion of Chinese exports to ASEAN are intermediate goods slated for reprocessing for other markets, including the US, a significant portion constitute finished products targeted for ASEAN consumers.

However, the spike in Chinese imports is creating competition with local manufacturers, and has already raised concerns about deindustrialization in Indonesia and Thailand. Job destruction in Indonesia was one factor behind the recent intense political protests there.

Southeast Asian countries are adopting a multipronged strategy to escape being squeezed by the two superpowers.

First, there is defense. The surge in cheap Chinese imports arising from industrial overcapacity has already prompted several ASEAN nations to impose anti-dumping duties on certain commodities or to commence investigations.

Moreover, while the ASEAN bloc recently signed an updated free-trade agreement with China, the region is also seeking to assuage US concerns by adopting more stringent customs and origin verification systems to address increasingly rigorous US tariff rules on transshipments from China.

Next, there is offense. Southeast Asian countries are working to enhance their manufacturing capabilities to promote trade diversification and movement away from transshipment.

Looking forward, ASEAN’s exports to the US are expected to increasingly be driven by investments in advanced manufacturing, originating not just from China, but from Japan and South Korea.

Other initiatives encouraging greater ASEAN integration are also being launched. The Master Plan on ASEAN Connectivity 2025 framework was recently adopted, which seeks to enhance physical infrastructure, digital networks, seamless logistics and migration between ASEAN nations.

However, such schemes have been attempted previously with limited success.

For example, the Master Plan for ASEAN Connectivity 2010 fell short of expectations as a consequence of tight investment restrictions and the challenges of getting skilled workers to move.

The acceleration of intra-ASEAN integration and intra-regional trade also continues to be stymied by wide disparities in ASEAN income levels, and differences in the ability to handle complex and sophisticated production processes.

In fact, despite the various plans adopted to strengthen trade among ASEAN countries in recent years, intraregional trade has actually been declining since 2013, while trade with China has grown rapidly.

Ultimately, antagonizing China risks the potential loss of Chinese manufacturing investment and reduced access to the country’s large services market.

Yet, over the long term, tilting toward the US does not seem to be the natural choice, especially when Washington is looking to reshore manufacturing and disengage from China-centric supply chains.

For now, ASEAN seems to be caught between a rock and a hard place.

The views expressed here are those of Manishi Raychaudhuri, the founder and CEO of Emmer Capital Partners Ltd and the former head of Asia-Pacific Equity Research at BNP Paribas Securities.


A hairdresser from Belo Horizonte has found herself at the center of an election scandal threatening India’s democracy

What is a Latin American hairdresser doing in a local election about 14,000km away?

At a press conference in New Delhi last week, Rahul Gandhi, the leader of India’s opposition, posed just that question, as he filled the screen behind him with excerpts of electoral rolls from a state poll last year. Each of the 22 women on the list had a different name, like Seema, Sweety and Saraswati, but they all carried the same stock picture of a young woman. Gandhi identified her as a Brazilian fashion model.

Larissa Nery, a 29-year-old from Belo Horizonte, Brazil, later confirmed that the photo was indeed hers, although she is a hairdresser, not a fashion model. She has, nonetheless, become an overnight sensation in India, the face of what Gandhi claims is an organized scheme to subvert the world’s largest democracy.

According to data compiled by his investigations team, the voter identities created with Nery’s photo were part of 2.5 million such fake records in last year’s assembly polls in Haryana state.

One in eight voters in the northern state were fake, Gandhi said.

“They either don’t exist, or they’re duplicate, or they’re designed in a way for anybody to vote,” he said.

Gandhi’s Indian National Congress party effectively lost its chance to wrest power in the state by less than 23,000 votes to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

This was Gandhi’s third attack in four months on India’s Election Commission, which he has accused of running a systematic campaign of “vote chori” — “vote theft” in Hindi — in collusion with the BJP. After his first presentation in August, the three-member body held its own press conference in which it dared the opposition leader to file an affidavit within seven days to make his claims official — or apologize to the nation.

Gandhi did neither. This time, the commission has asked him to explain why no objections were filed when electoral rolls for Haryana were shared ahead of the polls with all political parties. A BJP minister said the attack on the integrity of elections was part of a well-planned conspiracy to damage the country’s image.

In his Ted Talk-style presentation, Gandhi directly addressed Gen-Z voters, warning them that India’s democracy was in peril. In recent years, even independent researchers have come to share that dim view. The V-Dem Institute, an independent research unit at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, demoted the country to “electoral autocracy” in 2021.

India’s trajectory “is emblematic of the world’s democratic recession,” Oxford University political scientist Maya Tudor noted in her chapter for a book last year.

In a 2023 paper, economist Sabyasachi Das described what according to him was statistical evidence of manipulation.

It “appears to take the form of targeted electoral discrimination against India’s largest minority group — Muslims,” he wrote.

Amid the furor triggered by his research, Das resigned from India’s Ashoka University the same year.

Over the past decade, global investors have cared little about any of this. After a short spike in market volatility following the unexpected erosion of the BJP’s majority in last year’s parliamentary election, the bigger shock for investors has been the sudden deterioration in New Delhi’s international standing. Nobody expected US President Donald Trump to banish his friend to a tariff hell, while doing a trade deal with China.

That debilitating 50 percent tax on exports to the US, and the fact that a frothy stock market has nothing to offer in a high-growth area like artificial intelligence, is what is making them sour on India, not local politics. With domestic retail investors fueling a US$200 million-an-hour boom in initial public offerings, Gandhi’s vote theft allegations are a sideshow even to the middle class. The unemployed youth care more about finding jobs. The apathy is partly because opposition parties have no obvious end goal. No matter how unfair they allege the elections to be, it is highly unlikely that they would ever boycott them.

Take Bihar, where polling in two stages began on Thursday last week, a day after Gandhi’s press conference. Results are to be announced tomorrow. The eastern state is currently under the BJP’s indirect control. Nitish Kumar, the 74-year-old chief minister, is a key Modi ally. To present a credible alternative to BJP’s Hindu right-wing politics, Gandhi and his coalition partner, regional politician Tejashwi Yadav, badly need a win in the poorest Indian state.

However, the Election Commission’s role has come up for scrutiny in Bihar, too. The watchdog is facing legal challenges in the Indian Supreme Court to a last-minute overhaul of the state’s electoral rolls. The recast has disqualified millions of existing voters.

Since the commission wants to take the so-called “special intensive revision” national, Tamil Nadu state has preemptively challenged the constitutional validity of such an exercise. The southern state is to go to the polls next year. Just as making a dent in the poor, overpopulated north is important for Gandhi, expanding the BJP’s reach in the rapidly industrializing and relatively affluent south is crucial for Modi.

India’s elections were never perfect, but while it was hoped that a fully electronic process would end decades of violent hijacking of polling booths, especially in rural and remote areas, automation has not done much for robustness.

Analysts have expressed alarm over poll percentages that keep rising even after voting has ended. The Election Commission, which says late-arriving data take time to collate, has refused to make available surveillance footage from booths on privacy grounds. Opposition politicians say the opacity allows people to cast ballots from multiple locations, or under manufactured identities. The commission has repeatedly rejected such claims as false and misleading.

If nothing else, Larissa Nery’s unwitting entry into the battlefield would add to calls for greater transparency. Although his presentation fell short of proving that the Brazilian hairdresser’s picture was indeed used to steal 22 votes from his Congress party, Gandhi has nonetheless raised a significant doubt about the health of India’s electoral democracy.

Andy Mukherjee is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering industrial companies and financial services in Asia. Previously, he worked for Reuters, the Straits Times and Bloomberg News. This column reflects the personal views of the author and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

A Brazilian stylist wades into Indian politics


DECISIVE GAME: Alcaraz, who was replaced by Sinner as world No. 1 earlier this month, will finish this year at the top of the rankings if he beats Musetti today

Carlos Alcaraz on Tuesday battled to victory over Taylor Fritz at the ATP Finals, moving to within one win of securing the year-end No. 1 ranking for the second time.

The five-time Grand Slam champion made it two wins from two in the Jimmy Connors Group with a comeback 6-7 (2/7), 7-5, 6-3 victory over last year’s runner-up Fritz in Turin, Italy.

He would have qualified for the semi-finals if Alex de Minaur beat home hope Lorenzo Musetti in Tuesday’s second match.

Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz returns to the US’ Taylor Fritz during their ATP Finals tennis match in Turin, Italy, on Tuesday. Photo: AP

However, Musetti, who only qualified for the Finals on Saturday after Novak Djokovic pulled out with injury — shortly after beating the Italian in the final of the Athens event — beat the Australian 7-5, 3-6, 7-5.

“I’m really happy that I was able to come back, find my good tennis,” Alcaraz said. “I just tried to make the most of the opportunities that he gave to me. I think we played great tennis, some great points.”

Alcaraz, who was replaced by rival Jannik Sinner as world No. 1 following the Paris Masters earlier this month, will finish this year at the top of the rankings if he beats Musetti today.

Sinner has to successfully defend his Finals title, unbeaten, to have any chance of ending the season as No. 1 for a second straight year.

“I will try not to think about it,” Alcaraz said of the year-end No. 1 ranking. “It’s going to be a really big match.”

Alcaraz now holds a 5-1 winning record against Fritz, whose only win against the Spaniard came at the Laver Cup in September.

The US’ Fritz is to face De Minaur in his last group contest.

Fritz on Monday swept aside Musetti in his opener with a dominant serving display.

Alcaraz immediately showed he would put up stronger resistance on return, but Fritz managed to hold in a lengthy first game, hitting three aces and saving two break points.

The Spaniard also had to dig deep to level at 1-1, staving off three break points himself.

He appeared to have made the most of that mistake as Fritz was broken for the first time in the tournament, but Alcaraz could not consolidate the break and dropped serve too.

Both players’ serves continued to be tested, with Alcaraz seeing off two more break points in the eighth game as the first set eventually went to a tie-break.

However, Fritz powered through the breaker, sealing a one-set lead after 70 minutes with his sixth ace.

Some brutal hitting with his forehand brought up the first break point of the second set for Fritz in the fifth game, but Alcaraz came out on top in a dramatic rally to save it.

Alcaraz saw off a second break point with an ace and finally got out of the draining, 21-minute service game when Fritz fired long, celebrating as if he had won the match.

Fritz fought through a difficult game himself to make it 4-all after Alcaraz netted a return on break point, as the second set edged toward another tiebreak.

However, Fritz buckled under the pressure in the 12th game, as two wild unforced errors helped bring up three set points for Alcaraz.

The 22-year-old took the second opportunity, with a rasping passing shot forcing a deciding set.

Fritz managed to stay on serve early in the third set, but the momentum of the match had shifted, and Alcaraz grabbed the crucial break in the sixth game.

Sixth seed Fritz showed great resolve to save three match points in game eight, but Alcaraz successfully served it out to love, sealing the win as Fritz blasted a backhand wide.

Alcaraz beats US’ Fritz at ATP Finals


Mavericks fire Harrison, who traded Doncic away

Nico Harrison, who oversaw the trade of Luka Doncic from Dallas to the Los Angeles Lakers, was fired on Tuesday as general manager and president of basketball operations for the Mavericks.

The Dallas Mavericks owner Patrick Dumont announced the move with the team off to a 3-8 start and fans chanting “fire Nico” at every home game.

Slovenian superstar Doncic, a Dallas fan favorite, has helped revive the Lakers, joining Wilt Chamberlain as the only NBA players to score at least 40 points in the first three games of a season.

Los Angeles Lakers guard Luka Doncic reacts during their NBA game against the Minnesota Timberwolves in Los Angeles on Oct. 24. Photo: AP

Meanwhile, the Mavs have struggled with Kyrie Irving sidelined by a knee injury despite obtaining Anthony Davis in the trade and boasting this season’s NBA Draft top pick Cooper Flagg.

“This decision reflects our continued commitment to building a championship-caliber organization, one that delivers for our players, our partners, and most importantly, our fans,” Dumont said.

The Mavericks appointed vice president of player personnel Michael Finley and assistant general manager Matt Riccardi as co-interim general managers to oversee basketball operations.

Dallas Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison looks on before their NBA match against the Oklahoma City Thunder in Fort Worth, Texas, on Oct. 6. Photo: Jerome Miron-Imagn Images/USA Today

After Harrison took over in June 2021, the Mavericks lost to Boston in the 2024 NBA Finals and dropped the 2022 Western Conference finals to Golden State.

Dumont released a letter to fans explaining his decision and seeking continued support.

“No one associated with the Mavericks organization is happy with the start of what we all believed would be a promising season,” he wrote. “You have high expectations for the Mavericks, and I share them with you. When the results don’t meet expectations, it’s my responsibility to act.”

Dumont said he knows the team’s players are “deeply committed to a winning culture,” adding that “this decision was critical to moving our franchise forward in a positive direction.”

He thanked fans for their patience and support and, without mentioning the Doncic trade.

“I understand the profound impact these difficult last several months have had. Please know that I’m fully committed to the success of the Mavericks,” Dumont said.


Sinner’s doping controversy to linger, Djokovic says

Novak Djokovic said the shortness and timing of Jannik Sinner’s ban this year for an inadvertent doping violation was “odd” and the case would hang over the four-time Grand Slam champion like a cloud for the rest of his career.

Sinner served a three-month suspension following a settlement with the World Anti-Doping Agency in February after authorities accepted the anabolic agent clostebol had entered his system inadvertently via massages from his then-physiotherapist in March last year.

Djokovic said he did not believe Sinner had acted deliberately, but added the controversy over the perceived disparity between Sinner’s treatment and that of lesser-known athletes would linger around the Italian, much like his own deportation from Australia in 2022 over his refusal to take a COVID-19 vaccine.

Novak Djokovic plays against Flavio Cobolli during their men’s singles quarter-final match of the Wimbledon Championships in England on July 9. Photo: AFP

“That cloud will follow him just as the cloud of COVID will follow me, for the rest of his, or my career in this case,” Djokovic said in an interview with Piers Morgan.

“It’s just something that ... it was so major, and when that happens, over time it will fade, but I don’t think it will disappear. There’s always going to be a certain group of people that will always try to bring that forward,” he said.

Djokovic raised questions about the handling of Sinner’s case after the 24-year-old was allowed to return to action in May without missing a Grand Slam.

The International Tennis Integrity Agency has remained firm that all its cases are dealt with based on facts and evidence, and not a player’s name or ranking.

“There is the lack of transparency, the inconsistency, the convenience [of] the ban coming, between the slams, so he doesn’t miss the others — it’s just, it was very, very odd,” Djokovic added. “I really don’t like how the case was being handled, and you could hear so many other players, both male and female, who had some similar situations coming out in the media, and complaining that it was a preferable treatment.”


Ronaldo says 2026 World Cup to be his last

Portuguese superstar Cristiano Ronaldo on Tuesday said next year’s FIFA World Cup would be his last as he winds down one of the all-time great careers.

The 40-year-old forward, with more than 950 club and international goals, also said he would retire from soccer in “one or two years.”

“Definitely, yes,” he told a Saudi forum by video link, when asked if it would be his final World Cup next year.

Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo, left, laughs during a training session in Oeiras, Portugal, on Tuesday. Photo: EPA

“I’m gonna be 41 years old, and I think it will be the moment,” he said.

Ronaldo, who began a lucrative stint at Saudi Arabia’s Al-Nassr in 2023, also elaborated on comments last week when he said he would retire “soon.”

“Let’s be honest, when I mean soon, it’s probably one or two years I’ll still be at the game,” he said.

The five-time Ballon d’Or winner is hoping to play at his sixth World Cup next year. He came closest to lifting the trophy on debut in 2006, when Portugal lost to France in the semi-finals.

Portugal have yet to qualify for next year’s tournament in the US, Canada and Mexico, but can secure their spot if they beat Ireland tonight.

Last month, Ronaldo became the top goalscorer in World Cup qualifying history when he netted twice against Hungary to reach 41 goals, overtaking retired Guatemalan international Carlos Ruiz’s 39.

The former Manchester United, Real Madrid and Juventus forward is also the all-time leading international goalscorer with 143 strikes.

During an interview on Piers Morgan Uncensored last week, Ronaldo opened up further about the realities of his looming retirement.

“It will be difficult? Yes. Probably will cry, yes. I’m an open person. It will be very, very difficult, yes,” he said.

Ronaldo joined Al-Nassr after leaving Manchester United for a second time in late 2022, a move that heralded an influx of late-career stars to the oil-rich kingdom.

Ronaldo signed for 200 million euros (US$231.5 million) a year, according to a source close to Al-Nassr at the time, and inked a two-year contract extension in June.

Last month, he was named by Bloomberg as the sport’s first billionaire, and topped Forbes’ list of highest-paid soccer players for the sixth time in a decade.

With on-and off-field earnings of an estimated US$280 million, Ronaldo is to earn more than double that of second-placed rival Lionel Messi during the upcoming season, Forbes said.

Saudi Arabia, which is spending big on sports and entertainment as part of its economic diversification plan, was named in December last year as host of the 2034 FIFA World Cup.


Norwegian forward Andreas Schjelderup, who plays for Benfica, would plead guilty in Denmark after sharing a video of a sexual nature that included minors, the Norwegian Football Association on Monday.

Danish media reported that the soccer player was suspected of sharing a 27-second video via social media.

“Schjelderup made a mistake, a very serious mistake, for which he is criminally liable,” Norwegian Football Federation president Lisa Klaveness told reporters.

Benfica’s Andreas Schjelderup looks on during their Liga Portugal match against Alverca in Alverca do Ribatejo, Portugal, on Aug. 31. Photo: AFP

She added that he would plead guilty at a hearing at a Danish court on Wednesday next week.

The 21-year-old striker on Saturday evening apologized in a post to Instagram, admitting to having made a “stupid mistake” two years ago while playing for Danish club Nordsjaelland.

“I received a short video and forwarded it to my friend a few seconds later, without thinking clearly,” he said.

“I only saw the first few seconds and not what the video developed into. My friend, after having seen it a few seconds later, reminded me directly that it was, of course, illegal to send, so I deleted it immediately,” Schjelderup added.

Danish police only confirmed the date of the hearing. Under Danish law, sharing sexual images involving children is punishable by a fine or up to two years in prison.

Schjelderup is expected to receive a suspended sentence, Danish media reports said.

“We are firmly convinced that there is no need to impose an additional penalty,” Klaveness said.

Schjelderup to plead guilty to sharing video of minors


PLANE GOES DOWN:  A minister wrote: ‘Our heroic comrades-in-arms were martyred’ when a C-130 military plane crashed near the border between Georgia and Azerbaijan

All 20 personnel on board a military cargo plane that crashed in Georgia were killed, Turkish Minister of National Defense Yasar Guler said yesterday.

The C-130 plane had taken off from Ganja, Azerbaijan, and was on its way to Turkey when it crashed on Tuesday in Georgia’s Sighnaghi municipality, close to the Azerbaijani border. The cause of the crash is being investigated.

A Turkish accident investigation team reached the crash site early yesterday and was inspecting the wreckage of the plane, in coordination with the Georgian authorities, the Turkish Ministry of National Defense said.

Rrescue workers stand at the site of a plane crash near Sighnaghi, Georgia, on Tuesday. Photo: EPA / Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia Press Service

The wreckage was spread across a plain that includes farmland and is surrounded by hills, Turkish private broadcaster NTV reported from the site.

Debris from the aircraft was scattered across multiple locations, the report said.

“Our heroic comrades-in-arms were martyred on November 11, 2025, when our C-130 military cargo plane, which had taken off from Azerbaijan en route to our country, crashed near the Georgia-Azerbaijan border,” Guler wrote on X, together with photographs of the military personnel who were killed.

On Tuesday, Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency quoted the Georgian aviation authority as saying that contact with the plane was lost a few minutes after it had entered Georgia’s airspace.

The plane had not issued a distress signal, it said.

C-130 military cargo planes are widely used by Turkey’s armed forces for transporting personnel and handling logistical operations.

Turkey and Azerbaijan maintain close military cooperation.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and other Turkish officials had attended Azerbaijan’s Victory Day celebrations in Baku on Saturday last week marking Azerbaijan’s military success over Armenia in the 2020 control of Karabakh region, known internationally as Nagorno-Karabakh, a conflict that had lasted nearly four decades.

It was not immediately clear if the military personnel on the cargo had attended the ceremonies.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Georgian Minister of Foreign Affairs Maka Botchorishvili extended their condolences to their Turkish counterparts over Tuesday’s crash.

“We are deeply shocked by the news of the loss of life of our soldiers in the accident that occurred on Georgian soil,” Aliyev said in a message, Anadolu reported.

US Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack offered his condolences and affirmed Washington’s solidarity with Ankara.

NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte also extended his sympathies, honored the military personnel who were killed and thanked all NATO personnel for their service.

There was no information on funeral arrangements or when the remains would be returned to Turkey.

Crash kills Turkish military personnel


Colombia halts intelligence sharing with US

CARIBBEAN ARRIVAL: Venezuela said that it had organized a nationwide military deployment after a US aircraft carrier strike group arrived in the region

Colombian President Gustavo Petro on Tuesday ordered his nation’s security forces to stop sharing intelligence with the US until the administration of US President Donald Trump stops its strikes on suspected drug traffickers in the Caribbean.

Petro wrote on X that Colombia’s military must immediately end “communications and other agreements with US security agencies” until the US ceases its attacks on speedboats suspected of carrying drugs.

Petro wrote that “the fight against drugs must be subordinated to the human rights of the Caribbean people.”

Venezuelan Minister of Defense Vladimir Padrino Lopez, right, observes a soldier holding an Igla-S missile launcher during a training exercise in Caracas on Tuesday. Photo: AFP / Venezuelan Ministry of Defense

It was not immediately clear what kind of information Colombia would stop sharing with the US.

The White House had no immediate response to Petro’s statements.

At least 75 people have been killed by the US military in strikes in international waters since August, according to figures supplied by the Trump administration. The strikes began in the southern Caribbean, near Venezuela’s shores, but have shifted recently to the eastern Pacific, where the US has targeted boats off Mexico.


Tanzanian politicians are in shock over the massacre of hundreds of young protesters during its recent election, insiders told Agence France-Presse, but are too afraid to speak out as a tiny cabal around the president takes control.

Gruesome images of dead Tanzanians have flooded the Internet in the wake of the Oct. 29 elections that triggered widespread protests over government repression.

Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan officially won with 98 percent of the vote, but key opposition leaders were jailed or disqualified.

Funeral for an opposition youth leader killed during election protests. Photo :AFP

The opposition said that more than 1,000 people were killed as security forces crushed the protests under cover of a five-day Internet blackout.

Two weeks on, the government has yet to give any casualty numbers.

“There are ... disturbing reports that security forces have been seen removing bodies from streets and hospitals, and taking them to undisclosed locations in an apparent attempt to conceal evidence,” UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said on Tuesday.

A senior official in the Tanzanian government who said they were horrified by the events of the past two weeks agreed to talk to AFP.

The official said they would end up dead if their name was published, but provided AFP with coordinates for two suspected sites of mass graves near Dar es Salaam — at Kondo and Mabwepande.

The nature of the sites could not be independently verified.

AFP was not in a position to independently verify the sites.

A tiny cabal around Hassan now has total control over the levers of power and repression in the east African country, said the official and a former presidential adviser, who also spoke on condition of anonymity.

“People in the government are in shock ... there’s disbelief,” the official said. “Nobody has the guts to talk ... that’s the sad part of it, but people do whisper.”

AFP has spoken to multiple eyewitnesses who describe seeing people shot at point-blank range by police and unidentified armed men.

One described a bystander shot in the head by a soldier in Dar es Salaam on election day.

The next day he saw three people lined up and shot “five or six times” in the legs by police.

The opposition has called fresh protests for independence day on Dec. 9.

“We really don’t know what to do,” the government official said. “Do we want more demos? No, because the youth are going to be executed again.”

The group around the president includes her son Abdul Halim Hafidh Ameir; her private secretary, Waziri Salum; head of the intelligence service Suleiman Abubakar Mombo; and a little-known member of the East African parliament, Angela Kizigha, the two government sources said.

“There’s a very, very tiny cabal who is informing and influencing the president and running the country,” the former presidential adviser said.

“It’s unprecedented and very un-Tanzanian,” they said. Everyone else “has been completely frozen out.”

The violence began more than a year before the elections, with critics attacked, kidnapped and murdered.

Ameir has “a private militia and most of the people believe that’s the one involved in the abductions from the beginning,” the official said.

The government has denied responsibility for abductions.

Spokespeople did not respond to AFP requests for comment for this article.

Prior to the election, the Tanganyika Law Society had confirmed 83 abductions under Hassan’s rule, but said reported disappearances increased significantly in the final days of the campaign. Some were high-profile, like former government spokesman and ambassador Humphrey Polepole, reported missing from his blood-stained home on Oct. 6 after resigning in a letter that criticized Hassan’s government.

Others were unknown individuals in small villages, seemingly targeted for minor online posts.

“Why are you abducting a 20-year-old kid just because they criticized you? You’re the president, for crying out loud,” the government official said.

Hassan inherited the presidency on the sudden death of former Tanzanian president John Magufuli in 2021. She faced strong opposition from within the party, but was feted for easing restrictions on the opposition and media.

That opening proved short-lived, as repression returned worse than ever last year.

“The only explanation is deep-seated paranoia ... and now it’s out of control,” the former adviser said.

Those with power “know one tool ... a very brutal, crude, authoritarian tool,” they said.

Members of parliament talk constantly about the killings, but are paralyzed by fear of the security services and also terrified of facing their constituents in the future,” the official said. “What’s clear is that Tanzania will never be the same again.”

Tanzanian politicians in shock as cabal takes over


Prague cathedral’s organ set to pipe up

St Vitus Cathedral in Prague, a favorite feature of postcards from the Czech capital, is next year set to inaugurate a long-awaited organ that befits its Gothic splendor.

Located at Prague Castle in the city’s UNESCO-listed historic center, the landmark cathedral, whose construction spanned from 1344 to 1929, has already housed a dozen organs.

However, the last one, installed in 1931, proved inadequate for the acoustics of the majestic cathedral, which drew 2.6 million visitors last year.

Chief voicer Andre Lacroix sits at the keyboard of the new organ at St Vitus Cathedral at Prague Castle on Wednesday last week. Photo: AFP

“It was originally meant to be the largest instrument in the world, but as so often with big plans, it didn’t happen,” organologist Stepan Svoboda told reporters. “So we have been waiting for a large organ for almost a century.”

The new instrument on the western wall almost seems to float over the choir, its glass decorations reflecting the light that spills into the room through a large rose window.

Made in the German organ builder Gerhard Grenzing’s workshop in Spain, it is being “voiced” — a process that involves adjusting its tones to the acoustics of the room — in time for its inauguration concert on June 15 next year.

With more than 6,000 pipes ranging from several millimeters to 11m in size, the organ was first assembled in Spain, then dismantled and transported to Prague in trucks.

Grenzing’s design aims to “offer a sound that is pleasant for the Czech listener,” said Vojtech Matl, head of the St Vitus Organ Foundation.

“He made a tour of Czech churches and studied the local organs carefully,” Matl said.

Grenzing made last-minute changes to his project after discovering that the Prague cathedral’s porous sandstone walls slowed down the sound.

After 11 years of painstaking preparations, installation in the cathedral began in March.

The voicing is expected to take 900 hours.

The cathedral closes at 4pm every day — earlier than usual, as voicers require absolute silence and work from closing until midnight.

Hoping to finish the job by the year’s end, chief voicer Andre Lacroix said he adjusted the sound of each pipe for the new environment.

“We have to work on all the sound parameters, pipe by pipe,” Lacroix told reporters, squeezed inside the organ, surrounded by pipes and tapping on the metal pieces with a little hammer.

“You adjust the height of the bevel, the hole [and] adjust the opening of the foot at the wind inlet. And then you adjust the length of the pipe, which gives you the pitch,” he said, describing the meticulous process.

Donors, including tens of thousands of ordinary Czechs, have so far contributed 114 million korunas (US$5.4 million).

“The organ will cost 105 million korunas, the design will cost 25 million [korunas], and we also need money for all the tests,” Matl said.

He listed a variety of donors: a man sending US$5,000, an elderly woman selling a historic coin and another with a plastic bag full of Australian dollars.

Many have contributed by “adopting” a pipe — literally buying it to have their name assigned to it.

The crowdfunding drive resembles a collection to build Prague’s National Theatre in the late 19th century under the motto of “The nation for itself.”

“Grannies and grandpas adopted pipes to bear the names of their grandchildren. Some got it for baptism, some for Christmas,”


AUSTRALIA

Indonesia deal inked

Canberra and Jakarta have agreed to sign a new security treaty, which includes closer military cooperation, the two countries’ leaders said after talks in Sydney yesterday. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, speaking alongside Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto at a Royal Australian Navy Base in Sydney, said that they had “just substantively concluded negotiations on a new bilateral treaty on our common security. This treaty is a recognition from both our nations that the best way to secure... peace and stability is by acting together,” Albanese said. He said he hoped to visit Indonesia next year to sign the new treaty. Prabowo said that the deal committed the two countries to “close cooperation in the defense and security field.”

AUSTRALIA

Court blocks Russia

The High Court yesterday blocked Russia from building a new embassy in Canberra, unanimously upholding a law that canceled its lease on national security grounds. Russia owned a lease to a plot of land that is about 300m from Parliament House and intended to build a new embassy building there to replace an older building elsewhere in the capital, but in 2023, the government introduced a law to cancel the lease after receiving “very clear security advice as to the risk presented by a new Russian presence so close to Parliament House,” Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said at the time. Russia challenged the law at the court, arguing that parliament was not authorized under the constitution to pass such a law. Yesterday, the court ruled unanimously that the Home Affairs Act validly invoked parliament’s constitutional power to seize land on “just terms,” although it said that Moscow was entitled to compensation.

SOUTH KOREA

Ex-spy chief arrested

A former South Korean spy chief who led the intelligence agency during last year’s martial law declaration was arrested yesterday for alleged dereliction of duty, a court told reporters. The arrest follows a request by special prosecutors for a warrant against Cho Tae-yong, former head of the National Intelligence Service, on charges including that he ignored his duties as spy agency chief and posed a risk of destroying evidence. The Seoul Central District Court reviewed the validity of the warrant on Tuesday and granted it. “The outcome of the review is ... the issuance of the warrant on the risk of evidence destruction,” the court said in a statement. “The primary charge is dereliction of duty.” Prosecutors said that Cho, a career diplomat who led the spy agency at the time of former president Yoon Suk-yeol’s martial law declaration in December last year, failed to report the move to parliament despite “understanding its illegality.” He is also accused of making false statements.

THAILAND

Extradition approved

An appeals court on Monday approved the extradition to China of She Zhijiang (佘智江), an alleged transnational crime kingpin accused by Beijing of having run more than 200 illegal online gambling operations. He was arrested in Bangkok in August 2022 on a 2014 arrest warrant from China’s police and is in the Klong Prem Central Prison in Bangkok. She’s legal team had challenged the constitutionality of Thailand extradition law, but that was rejected last month. Monday’s ruling calls for him to be sent to China within 90 days.

World News Quick Take


蔣萬安 朱立倫 吳敦義 賴清德 鄭麗文 盧秀燕 馬英九 洪秀柱 連戰

Donovan’s Deep Dives: KMT’s Cheng Li-wun sowing disunity right out of the gate

Less than two weeks since taking office as Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chair, people are already asking how long Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) will remain in office. She is already mired in controversy, both inside and outside the party.

It is not an unreasonable question. This century, only three of 15 KMT chairs have served full terms: Lien Chan (連戰, 2000-2005), Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九, 2009-2014), and Eric Chu (朱立倫, 2021-2025). Six others won elections and subsequently resigned and another six served as temporary caretakers.

She won the party chair election last month, appealing to the party’s pro-unification base, military veterans and on a platform of generational change. Cheng secured 65,000 votes to win with 50.15 percent of the vote in a low-turnout election.

Chinese Nationalist Party Chair Cheng Li-wun on Saturday attends the 1950s White Terror Autumn Memorial and Commemoration in Taipei. The event has been organized by the pro-unification “Taiwan Area Political Victims Mutual Aid Association” since 1999. Photo: Tu Chien-jung, Taipei Times

After her win, her top staff picks surprised many, tapping party stalwarts — mostly men in their 70s — and attracted criticism for not living up to the promise of generational change. She defended her choices as the party needing people of all generations, but in practice this was probably a shrewd move to shore up her support with key players in the party and to help with her own lack of executive experience.

On the eve of her inauguration, a Deutsche Welle interview with her dropped in which she defended Russian leader Vladimir Putin as democratically elected, blamed NATO for the Ukraine war and expressed fears that under President William Lai (賴清德) Taiwan would become another Ukraine.

Cheng doubled down on her comments, to much unease within the party. When asked, most KMT politicians answered with a variation on “no comment.”

OFFENDING EVERYONE

What she did next is so controversial it appeared almost perfectly engineered to sabotage KMT party unity. At her inauguration, Cheng said the party is confident it can demonstrate unprecedented unity. She is off to a bad start.

Last Saturday, Cheng attended a memorial for victims of the White Terror in the 1950s at Taipei’s Machangding Memorial Park (馬場町紀念公園), where many were executed. Unlike the 228 uprising and subsequent massacres, the White Terror was disproportionately directed at those who fled the Chinese Civil War and arrived in and around 1949.

Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) KMT-led Republic of China (ROC) lost the civil war in large part to effective Chinese Communist Party (CCP) propaganda and infiltration within the KMT, breeding a network of spies, traitors and turncoats. The White Terror was a brutal purge intended to remove any and all Communists or anyone they even remotely suspected of being potentially sympathetic to the CCP cause.

The event was titled “1950s White Terror Autumn Memorial and Commemoration” (50年代白色恐怖秋祭追思慰靈大會), which has been organized by the pro-unification “Taiwan Area Political Victims Mutual Aid Association” (台灣地區政治受難人互助會) since 1999.

Beijing over the past few months has been on a big propaganda push, hosting a big parade and claiming to have played a significant role in the “Chinese People’s War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War” (World War II), and establishing a Commemoration Day of Taiwan’s Restoration commemorating the surrender of Japan on Taiwan in 1945.

As part of this push, Chinese state television launched a drama series, Silent Honor (沉默的榮耀), portraying Communist spies in the KMT as heroes, including most notably Wu Shi (吳石), a lieutenant general who was the ROC’s Ministry of National Defense’s deputy chief of the general staff, who among other things, provided the CCP with critical intelligence on KMT troop deployments in southeast China, southern China and Taiwan when the KMT government was based in Nanjing.

In the promotional materials to the press about the event provided by the organizers, Wu and the other spies in Silent Honor were mentioned. They were eventually caught and executed at Machangding in 1950, and their pictures were displayed at the event as “martyred heroes.”

It was also known in advance that people representing China’s Taiwan Democratic Self-Government League (台灣民主自治同盟) would be there. They are one of China’s eight nominal political parties that serve under the direction of the CCP.

It is not hard to see why many in the KMT would be horrified that their party leader was at an event, alongside representatives from a CCP-controlled Communist political party, honoring spies and traitors to the KMT cause — who were responsible for the defeat and deaths of countless ROC troops — as “martyred heroes.”

KMT politicians — including the normally taciturn Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) — distanced themselves and stated clearly they did not support this in any way.

SURVIVAL LIKELY SHORT-TERM

Could this lead to Cheng’s removal in the short term?

She defended herself by pointing out that she had never attended the event before, and that Wu Shi and the others had not been mentioned in their invitation to her. She said she was there to honor victims of political repression, not Wu or the others, which she said did not qualify as political victims.

It appears that she is correct about the invitation, and honoring victims of political repression — as opposed to executed spies and traitors — is a laudable act.

However, much of this was in the press the day before the event, which means that either she and her staff already knew, or are clueless at doing their jobs. Neither is a good look.

She has not apologized for any of it. That implies she feels she did nothing wrong, which rankles many.

To remove her in the short term would be extraordinarily difficult, and as long as she does not keep making these sorts of mistakes, she is likely secure in her job.

Many may be thinking of another pro-unificationist with whom Cheng is close and frequently compared to: Hung Hsiu-chu’s (洪秀柱) removal from the presidential ticket in 2015 after an outcry in the party. Could this happen now to Cheng?

Not likely. In that case, Hung was not the party chair. Cheng is the party chair, making it hard for the party to remove her.

Additionally, despite the party being eager to dump Hung as a losing candidate in 2015 because her pro-unificationist views were so deeply unpopular, they elected her party chairwoman just half a year later in 2016. Being unpopular with the public and likely to lose an election is one thing, what is popular inside the party is another.

NEXT YEAR’S CRUNCH TIMES

If Cheng continues on this path, things within the party could get serious next year in the late spring to early fall period as the 2026 local election campaigns start to ramp up. If her behavior is adversely impacting the candidates chances of winning, the situation in the party could get more serious.

Still, it is hard to oust a party chair, though not impossible. It would be an ugly process that could do as much harm as good.

A simpler path would be to sideline her.

As the 2018 local elections got into full swing then-party Chairman Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) appeared less and less at campaign events outside of Taipei and remote areas like Kinmen and Ilan. That year’s “Han wave” campaign rallies excluded or marginalized him.

The crucial test will be the results of next year’s election on Nov. 28. If the KMT does badly, Cheng would by custom be expected to resign.

Additionally, the party’s presumed nominee for president, Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕), will leave office on Dec. 25 next year, and there will likely be a push for her to take over as party chair, regardless of the results of the election.

While it is possible she could become so unpopular within the party she is ousted sooner, it is more likely that the big test will be late November and December of next year.

On the other hand, she may have learned from her recent mistakes, and things will go smoothly going forward.

But is that in her character?

Donovan’s Deep Dives is a regular column by Courtney Donovan Smith (石東文) who writes in-depth analysis on everything about Taiwan’s political scene and geopolitics. Donovan is also the central Taiwan correspondent at ICRT FM100 Radio News, co-publisher of Compass Magazine, co-founder Taiwan Report (report.tw) and former chair of the Taichung American Chamber of Commerce. Follow him on X: @donovan_smith.


The PRC security threat and complementary economies are drawing the two nations together

It’s always a pleasure to see something one has long advocated slowly become reality. The late August visit of a delegation to the Philippines led by Deputy Minister of Agriculture Huang Chao-ching (黃昭欽), Chair of Chinese International Economic Cooperation Association Joseph Lyu (呂桔誠) and US-Taiwan Business Council vice president, Lotta Danielsson, was yet another example of how the two nations are drawing closer together. The security threat from the People’s Republic of China (PRC), along with their complementary economies, is finally fostering growth in ties. Interestingly, officials from both sides often refer to a shared Austronesian heritage when arguing for greater cooperation.

According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), the government is working on “cooperation between Taiwan and the Philippines in such areas as ports, shipping, new energy, smart agriculture and semiconductors.” The Philippines is a top 10 trading partner. Since Manila kow-tows to the PRC and its one-China principle, it does not recognize Taiwan’s status under international law. However, in April Manila eased restrictions on government interactions in order to promote economic ties.

As various media have reported, defense links between Manila and Taipei are also broadening.

Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force frigate JS Noshiro, right, and US Navy USS Shoup, maneuver with Philippine Navy BRP Jose Rizal, not pictured, during the Philippines-US-Japan Multilateral Maritime Cooperative Activity off a disputed South China Sea shoal on March 28. Photo: AP

“To be very practical about it, if there is confrontation over Taiwan between China and the United States, there is no way that the Philippines can stay out of it simply because of our physical, geographic location,” President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. of the Philippines has stated. Security officials in the Philippines have said that since attempts to lower tensions with Beijing have failed, they are “entitled” to pursue closer relations with Taiwan.

Taiwanese military observers attended the US-Philippines exercises in April and May, while military officials from the Philippines have visited Taiwan, arriving as tourists, according to a recent Japan Times report. The Philippines has been beefing up its defense infrastructure in northern Luzon, near Taiwan. The two nations have also conducted joint coast guard patrols in the Bashi Channel between Taiwan and Luzon, according to media reports.

NSP+

President William Lai (賴清德) in March launched a revamped New Southbound Policy (NSP), the NSP+. It expands and deepens the NSP with six proposed NSP+ corridors. The first three corridors are digital technology and semiconductors, health and resilience. The latter three corridors emphasize people-to-people relations and civil society, including a think tank corridor, a corridor for non-governmental organizations and a youth corridor. People to people relations are booming: the Philippines was the number 1 southeast Asian source last year for tourists to Taiwan.

In pursuit of this, Taiwan’s representative to the Philippines, Wallace Chow (周民淦), has been pushing greater cooperation between the two countries through a series of articles emphasizing Taiwan’s role in promoting resilience.

“Taiwan is willing to share with the Philippines its operational, technology-backed, community-rooted expertise,” he wrote in BusinessWorld Online.

This effort is bearing fruit, according to an assessment of Taiwan’s soft power in the Philippines by Reymund Flores, a Philippines-based scholar, published by the National Bureau of Asian Research.

“Taipei’s initiatives have been largely effective in building a positive image of Taiwan among Filipinos,” he observed, noting that in the opening months of the pandemic, Taiwan was among the first countries to donate surgical masks and protective gowns to the Philippines.

Semiconductors may not leap to mind when the Philippines is mentioned, but assembly and testing services are growing there. Citing Moody’s, an article in the Philippine-based Politiko on Manila-Taipei cooperation observed that semiconductors were 32 percent of exports last year. Officials also cite the Philippines’ steady economic growth (5.6 percent last year) and young demographic profile (median age of 25.7) as incentives to increase trade.

The six corridors proposed by the Lai administration in March are components of the Taiwan-Philippines Economic Corridor currently being promoted by the government. That is typified by events such as the smart harbor forum slated for next month, which brings together representatives from the Port of Kaohsiung and the Port of Subic Bay in the Philippines. That effort in turn runs parallel to the larger Luzon Corridor of the US, Philippines and Japan, initiated last year.

PORTS AND SECURITY

The ports initiative is security-related. Several ports in the Philippines were targeted last year by cyberattacks that Filipino researchers think originated in the PRC. The attacks disrupted their container and navigation operations. Engineers from both countries in May began joint testing of an electronic system that monitors ocean and shipping conditions in Davao Bay on Mindanao. The next phase of cooperation involves using undersea drones for surveillance of the ocean floor in the Bashi Channel, one of the most important routes for telecommunications cables in Asia.

The growing connection between the two countries is mirrored in the way the world is using links with the Philippines to support regional defense efforts that may address a Taiwan scenario. Long-time Asia watcher Michael Mazza wrote of the world’s growing development of indirect links with Taiwan andㄩㄟ its defense and “the Philippines is emerging as the center of gravity for these efforts.” Mazza instanced a number of recent agreements and negotiations between the Philippines and nations such as Japan, Australia, South Korea and Canada that point to Manila’s pivotal role.

Because Taiwan is nervous about support from US President Donald Trump, it has been pursuing better relations with the EU. At the same time, Mazza says, the EU is putting a hand in via Manila as well. Paris and Manila began negotiating closer cooperation in June. The UK and the Philippines in January last year inked a Memorandum of Understanding on Defense Cooperation. This summer London followed by indicating interest in negotiating a Status of Visiting Forces agreement, according to Mazza.

The strong possibility of PRC strikes on the Philippines (the US has bases there) in the event of a PRC invasion of Taiwan implies that the 1951 US-Philippines Mutual Defense Treaty will be triggered. That would require Washington to intervene even if the US government did not want to defend Taiwan. This in fact gives Taipei some incentive to ensure that the conflict spills over to the Philippines and Japanese territory in the event Washington does not want to get involved with a Taiwan invasion. This will make it more difficult for the PRC to confine the war to Taiwan alone, increasing the odds that any conflict quickly becomes a regional war.

While many focus on how the Philippines will be dragged into a war over Taiwan, few have stopped to consider that the opposite could also occur. An incident of PRC aggression against Manilla, responded to by US forces, could pull in Taipei, which would likely be supporting the US.

Beijing protested to Manila in July, lodging “stern representations” over its burgeoning links with Taipei. The PRC could easily have better relations with the Philippines, where it has vast soft and hard power, but luckily for Taiwan, it is more interested in grabbing uninhabited shoals.

Notes from Central Taiwan is a column written by long-term resident Michael Turton, who provides incisive commentary informed by three decades of living in and writing about his adoptive country. The views expressed here are his own.

Notes from Central Taiwan: Growing Taipei-Manila ties


Why do people love spicy food — even when it hurts to eat it?Tearing up, sweating and other bodily functions are all signs that the body is trying to expel spicy foods as quickly as possible. But there is a simple reason why some people enjoy those sensations

The first thing to understand about eating spicy food is that it really isn’t a matter of taste. Capsaicin, the active chemical in capsicum plants that are a key ingredient in anything you’d think of as “spicy,” evolved as an irritant to stop mammals from chewing and destroying plant seeds. It acts on the nervous system directly through receptors in the tongue, throat and skin — no taste buds required — and, in theory, tells our bodies that the thing we’ve just ingested is something to get rid of as soon as possible. The obvious question, then, is: why do some of us like the sensation so much?

To start to understand that, it’s helpful to know a bit more about what’s going on in the body.

“Think of an engineering brief where we have to detect irritants in a system and clear them rapidly,” says Liam Browne, an associate professor at UCL who specializes in the neuroscience of sensory perception and pain. “Capsaicin binds to a receptor in the body called TRPV1, which is found in a specialised class of neurons called nociceptors that usually detect things that are potentially damaging to the body.”

Owner of Biologic farm with vegetables and fruits Anna Aivazidi in August picks up Mexican chili peppers in a field of her farm in Filiro, a suburb of Thessaloniki. Photo: AFP

When that happens, it’s like a little fire alarm goes off and activates parts of the autonomic nervous system, which regulates various involuntary bodily functions without conscious control.

“That’s what leads to all these physiological effects like tearing up, sweating, or your nose running,” says Browne. “It’s your body trying to get rid of the irritant.”

TRPV1 (pronounced trip-vee-one, if you’re explaining this to someone over a delicious curry) is also activated by other things, like your body’s temperature rising above 42C — the point where heat becomes tissue-damaging – and piperine, the main active component in black pepper, which gives a much more mild response. Other hot (but not exactly spicy) foods activate different receptors — mustard, wasabi and radishes are handled by TRPA1, while TRPM8 is mostly responsible for cold temperatures and menthol.

“You can actually find other chemicals that have a far more potent effect than capsaicin on TRPV1,” says Browne. “There’s one plant, Euphorbia resinifera, that’s known as ‘resin spurge’ because of its associations with the idea of purging. It contains resiniferatoxin, a capsaicin-like compound that’s often described as around 1,000 times more potent, and is genuinely dangerous.”

Yes, a YouTube creator has tried it.

So how are we enjoying any of this? After all, it’s not a recent development. The first evidence of people eating chilies comes from around 7000BC in Mexico and Central America, with similar plants being cultivated roughly 1,000 years later. Peppers weren’t introduced to Europe until about the 16th century, but they’ve boomed in popularity since: the global hot sauce market is projected to be worth US$5 billion (£3.8 billion) by 2030, up from just over $3bn two years ago. Who really likes crying out irritants and quaffing milk that much?

Firstly, some people have different variants of the TRPV1 gene, which change how easily it switches on and turns off after activation (interestingly, the gene is present but insensitive to capsaicin in all birds and one species of tree-shrew, letting them eat spicy seeds with impunity). But the receptors also become less sensitive over time, so it’s entirely possible to develop a relative immunity to moderately spicy foods — or deliberately cultivate one.

As for why we like it, that might be because of the sensation it causes.

“Research is still ongoing into how human brains learn what is and isn’t safe, including which foods are safe for consumption,” says Browne. “Recent work emphasizes prediction, context and controllability. The idea is that when you eat something spicy, you get an initial alarm-like ‘heat’ signal. With repeated exposure the peripheral response desensitizes, and the brain learns the cue is safe and under control. That shift in prediction and certainty is a large part of why the experience becomes tolerable — and then rewarding.”

The more spice you eat, the theory goes, the less intense the first painful part becomes, and the more relief you get afterwards.

“There’s also the idea of reappraisal, or the fact that through exposure and experience, we reframe the meaning of what the pain represents and that it’s actually safe for us,” says Browne. “That sense of control and mastery matters — on top of the social and cultural component of doing this with your family or friends. It’s the same logic as watching scary films or going on rollercoasters, sometimes called ‘benign masochism.’ Importantly, these learning and revaluation mechanisms also tell us something useful about pain more broadly: when a stimulus is mislabeled as threatening, reframing and restoring a sense of control can reduce its impact.”

Like other initially unpleasant experiences — think running, cold showers or hot saunas — pushing on through the initial pain also coaxes the body into releasing endorphins, transforming those Korean chicken wings into a mild sort of high.

But what do you do if you’ve been invited out for wings and you’re not feeling up to it? The first thing to remember is that capsaicin is fat-soluble and hydrophobic: this means that if you drink water it will stay where it is, while milk will dissolve the capsaicin and then bind to it, ultimately carrying it away.

Alcohol, in case you’re wondering, can dilute capsaicin, but won’t bind to it — and will only do the job if it’s present in high percentages, meaning that beer is unlikely to help. Yogurt, if you’ve got a little pot on the side, will do the same job as milk — but there’s an even tastier option.

“Mint ice-cream provides the fat and protein to carry capsaicin away but will also trigger your TRPM8 receptors, which signal coolness and can take the edge off TRPV1’s ‘heat pain,’” says Browne.

Keep a tub on hand next time you invite people over for a jalfrezi — and remind everyone that it’s a cultural ritual with deep historical resonances.


Book review: A wild ride with the poet of punk

Patti Smith’s incantatory voice shines through in this surprisingly revelatory follow up to ‘Just Kids’ and ‘M Train’

The post-pandemic flood of artist memoirs continues, but Patti Smith stands apart. The poet who wrote punk into existence before pivoting to pop stardom then ghosting fans to raise a family has, in the 21st century, leaned into literature and music with such vitality it has become hard to say which medium suits her better. It hardly matters. At 78 years old, Smith lives and breathes both.

Her latest memoir follows the tightly focused coming-of-age story Just Kids, published to great acclaim in 2010, and 2015’s more ruminative M Train. Bread of Angels splits the difference to create a more conventional autobiography. It could be described as Just Kids’ prequel and sequel, moving from Smith’s hardscrabble childhood to the near-present, where a striking twist takes the narrative back to her literal conception. It’s one of a number of revelations about an artist whose story would otherwise seem, by now, well-chiseled into the tablets of rock history.

But surprises don’t feel crucial to a work that builds its world as much through narrative voice as its description of events. That voice can take some getting used to. Oddly formal, even archaic, in tone, at times unrestrained if not undisciplined, Smith’s literary mind is a wild mare. It can occasionally feel repetitive or self-indulgent. But once you settle in, it casts a potent spell, and you’ll learn as much about the artist from her style as from the stories themselves.

The book begins with a Proustian invocation, flickering between present and distant past, Smith confessing her outsider desire to “disguise the miniature Quasimodo trapped inside an awkward child’s body,” and introducing a recurrent metaphor, her “rebel hump” — a sort of holy flaw she comes to accept, harness and ride.

Like many of us, she romanticizes her childhood; 70 pages in, she’s still just 10 years old. She idolizes her father, a damaged second world war vet who takes factory jobs to support his young family, moving them from a Philadelphia rooming house into nearly condemned government housing. They relocate 12 times before settling into a modest new development in rural south Jersey.

Smith was a sickly child. Diagnosed with TB, she was sent to Chattanooga to quarantine and recuperate with relatives. In response to her metaphysical inquiries, they enrolled her in Presbyterian Sunday school. She yearned to create; she recalls her “outstretched fingers trying to reach the ivory keys” of her grandmother’s “glowing spinet,” and she kept diaries scrupulously. She’d disappear into reveries — in one story, she was waylaid by a tortoise en route to school and absent-mindedly lost the morning communing with it. She found similar escape in vividly imagined playtimes with sister Linda, younger by 11 months, and little brother Todd.

“As our parents grappled with an uncertain fate, we practiced oblivion,” she writes, among many singing sentences; “the future was a grownup concern.”

There’s an awful lot of rambling through woods and yards, waiting for destiny to descend. It does, and you see the rebel artist being born in stop-motion. Smith refuses to salute the American flag in school, per the Jehovah’s Witness teachings her mother introduced her to. On her first trip to an art museum, Picasso and Modigliani light up her imagination. So do encounters with films (Lost Horizon), music (the Shirelles’ Will You Love Me Tomorrow, the album Another Side of Bob Dylan), and literature (Wilde’s The Selfish Giant, Rimbaud’s Illuminations). When art and religion inevitably clash, she chooses sides.

“I was told that there was no place for art in Christ’s Kingdom,” she writes of an exchange with a church elder, “and I was counseled to consider what I truly believed in. But I knew what I believed in.”

The tipping point comes when 19-year-old Smith announces she’s pregnant and, in solidarity, her brother confesses his own gender non-conformity. Smith gives her child up for adoption, heads to New York City, and begins the life chronicled in Just Kids. Those years, and her profound relationship with soulmate Robert Mapplethorpe, fly by in a blur here, the book’s tempo shifting from ramble to gallop. Her romance with Sam Shepard. Her debut at St Mark’s Church with guitarist Lenny Kaye. The touchstone CBGB residency.

We learn that Dylan invited her to join the fabled Rolling Thunder Revue, then bumped her off the lineup on opening night. She hints at a love triangle between herself, actor Maria Schneider and billionaire Paul Getty. She recounts her principled knack for shooting herself in the foot commercially (refusing to alter the lyrics to Pissing in a River for radio, or to lip-sync Because the Night on American Bandstand). A final show for 80,000 Italian fans, and a pre-retirement counseling session with William S Burroughs, mark her 1979 exit from the public eye.

The pace slows as Smith heads off to Michigan with MC5 guitarist Fred Smith. They live a bohemian love story: making their home in an abandoned hotel, refurbishing an old boat, traveling to far-flung artistic landmarks, money evidently available if not outrageously plentiful. They marry with just their parents in attendance. They have kids; she does laundry, and she writes. The narrative is radiant and intimate, but guarded.

“The trials and challenges that Fred and I suffered were our own,” she writes elliptically in one moving passage, alluding to her husband’s health, his drug history and whatever marital troubles they endured, declaring “his decline was the tragedy of my life.”

A transcendent sequence that follows — like those moments in her songs when poetic incantation takes flight — displays her eccentric writing style not as a tic but a superpower.

Fred Smith’s passing from heart failure in 1994 is followed by a cascade of other losses, deaths that trigger a creative rebirth. Michael Stipe cold-calls her (“confessing he was somewhat intoxicated”), jump-starting a long friendship. Allen Ginsberg urges her to return to the stage. Longtime comrade Tom Verlaine joins her band for a comeback tour. Dylan invites her to open some shows, and to sing a magnificent duet, Dark Eyes. She captures that moment with her childhood hero indelibly.

“I was somewhat nervous as Bob called me to the stage. I began the verse, and we sang the chorus together on the same microphone, our faces nearly touching. I could see tiny beads of sweat on his forehead and caught the intensity in his eyes. I gripped my dress and looked down at my bare feet, and for that moment I was just a widow and the raging young poet who once dominated my teenage senses, was just a man.”

There are new albums, endless tours, books, awards, a doubling down on activism. And as the narrative spins into an elegantly diaristic laundry list, she and her sister Linda discover something about their lineage that stops time, realigning the architecture of a remarkable life. It’s a beautiful moment of storytelling. Yet her DNA doesn’t change what the book has already made plain — that the Patti Smith we know gave birth to herself. She sang herself into being. She’s written — is still writing — her own story.


SPEAK UP: Golden Horse to run despite AI ‘actress’ debut (1/2) 金馬獎不畏AI來襲再度奔騰（上）

A: The 62nd Golden Horse Awards ceremony is set for next weekend. So what are the nominees for Best Narrative Feature?

B: The nominees are: A Foggy Tale, The Waves Will Carry Us, Left-Handed Girl, Queerpanorama and Mother Bhumi.

A: What about the nominees for Best Leading ActorActress?

B: Richie Koh, Will Or, Joseph Chang, Chang Chen and Lan Wei-hua are nominated for Best Leading Actor. Caitlin Fang, Rene Liu, Ariel Lin, Alexia Kao and Fan Bingbing are nominated for Best Leading Actress.

A: It’s a shame that many of those movies haven’t even been released yet. Meanwhile, some blockbusters won zero nominations this year. This may well affect the audience’s interest in the award show.

A: 第62屆金馬獎下週末即將登場！今年入圍最佳劇情片的有哪些？

B: 入圍的有︰《大濛》、《人生海海》、《左撇子女孩》、《眾生相》、《地母》。

A: 那入圍最佳男／女主角的有哪些？

B: 男主角有︰許瑞奇、柯煒林、張孝全、張震、藍葦華；女主角有︰方郁婷、劉若英、林依晨、高伊玲、范冰冰。

A: 可惜他們的電影大多還沒上映，幾部賣座強片又全數槓龜，多少會影響影迷觀注的熱度。

（By Eddy Chang, Taipei Times／台北時報張迪）


▲之前美國九位大法官的合影。但最左邊一位金斯伯格已經辭世。（圖／路透社）

文／朱錦華

美國向來被視為民主國家典章制度的典範，許多國家也跟著模仿，事實上，美國的民主制度存在著許多弊病（我曾撰文談過此點）。其中之一，就是他們的大法官制度。美國的大法官是由總統提名的（台灣也跟著學），而且是終身職，這就種下日後許多的禍端。

美國的「先聖先賢」當初立此法時，也許天真的以為總統以自身的崇高地位，提名大法官時，必然是大公無私的。而被提名者過關後又必然會堅守本身的神聖職責，作出公正嚴明的判決。然而歷史發展和人性證明，這是大錯特錯。如今美國總統提名大法官，旨在捍衛本身黨派的價值觀和利益。等而下之者，更讓他們淪為自己服務的工具，例如任總統川普。

▲美國總統川普提名的巴瑞特正式宣誓就職美國大法官。（圖／路透）

目前美國最高法院共有9位大法官，6人屬於保守派；其中3人由川普任命。結果就是：以保守派佔多數的最高法院近年作出了許多對川普或共和黨有利的判決。其中之一就是在2022年時，推翻「羅訴韋德案」(Roe v.Wade)，震撼全美（從此不再保障女性的墮胎權利，將墮胎合法性的決定權交還給各州）。

接下來，2024年總統大選年期間，最高法院又判決：暫停對所有指控川普案件的審理。這無疑是對競選總統第二任期的川普的一大助力，最後讓他贏得總統大選。然後，川普今年4月2日突然宣布對眾多貿易國開徵所謂「對等關稅」(Reciprocal Tariff），讓全球陷入一片恐慌。

▲川普「對等關稅」生效，一圖看美貿易夥伴如何接招。（製圖／記者葉睿涵）

對此一直悶聲不響的最高法院，卻在最近才宣布川普這番徵稅可能違法（開徵關稅權在國會）。直到11月5日，他們才開庭審理此案，以決定總統是否可以繼續根據1977年通過的《國際緊急經濟權力法》(IEEPA)，在無需國會授權的情況下自行徵收關稅。 讓人懷疑的是，「對等關稅」已經開徵超過半年了，大法官們為何拖到如今才打開天窗說亮話？如果判決「對等關稅」違法，那己經徵收了的怎麼辦？要退還嗎？如果退還，這無疑將是一項浩大工程。

而目前還不清楚最高法院何時才會作出裁決！ 所以，我的推測是：不管這些大法官是否在「打假球」，未來判決要嘛就是合理化川普的作為，讓他可以繼續徵稅下去。要嘛就是判決停止再徵，但已徵收的一律不退！川普最後還是可以安全退場。總括一句，今天美國的大法官不是美國的，而是川普的。我的看法是：大法官應該是由人民選出，每4年選一次！

國際火線／恐龍的後代：美國的「大法官之亂」


▲桃園市議員錢龍爭取「上南崁輕軌建設」。（圖／市議會國民黨團提供）

記者楊淑媛／桃園報導

桃園市議員錢龍12日在市政總質詢中，呼籲市府將「上南崁生活圈輕軌路線」納入第二階段捷運路網規劃，並與機場捷運銜接，滿足上南崁及蘆竹地區居民的雙北通勤需求，形塑完整的「軌道生活圈」，讓蘆竹的發展不再成為軌道建設的空白帶。

錢龍指出，明年即將通車的捷運綠線北段，主要路段位於中正北路，將帶動下南崁地區的交通發展；而行政院已核定的捷運青線，也將讓大竹生活圈受惠。然而，在上南崁地區，目前仍缺乏任何形式的捷運或輕軌服務，是蘆竹區的交通「黑洞」。

他表示：「蘆竹的上南崁人口稠密，卻沒有捷運直達系統，居民若要通勤雙北，仍得仰賴汽機車或公車。這不僅造成交通壅塞，也違背低碳運輸的城市發展方向。」

錢龍提出具體建議，上南崁輕軌可北接機捷A10山鼻站，沿桃3線南山路銜接至台4線中正路，進一步延伸至桃園市中心的主要路網，與既有捷運系統形成環狀連結。

他指出，南山路擁有20至25公尺寬的道路條件，且未來將設置國一甲桃3交流道，周邊更有桃林鐵路、營盤溪綠廊道與大坑溪景觀步道交會，具備完善的空間與交通條件，十分適合作為上南崁輕軌的主要走向。

「若能讓輕軌串聯機捷、銜接市區，蘆竹將真正融入桃園的軌道生活圈，讓上南崁不再成為軌道孤島。」錢龍說。

捷運工程局長劉慶豐回應，這項構想具前瞻性與可行性，將納入未來路網規劃研議，並安排實地勘查，作為下一階段評估的重要參考。

錢龍強調，捷運綠線北段七站預計明年通車，象徵蘆竹正式與桃園都會軌道網接軌，但「通車只是起點」。他要求市府務必在啟用前，確保各站周邊人行道、無障礙設施與轉乘系統同步完善，讓市民能「安全走路搭捷運、安心轉乘Ubike或公車」。

他指出，目前綠線北段沿線的Ubike布點稀少，公車路線不足，無法形成完整的低碳轉乘網路。錢龍要求交通局儘速提出具體的Ubike布點計畫與公車接駁藍圖，同時整合南崁溪水岸與自行車道系統，打造真正的「人本交通環境」。

錢龍表示，若上南崁輕軌順利推進，未來將與綠線、青線及機捷形成完整的環狀軌道圈，帶動整個蘆竹區的整體發展，促進交通公平與城鄉平衡。錢龍指出，他將持續監督並協助市府推動上南崁輕軌的可行性評估與地方協調，爭取納入中央捷運計畫核定，讓上南崁居民早日享有便捷、低碳又具未來性的軌道生活。

桃園市議員錢龍爭取「上南崁輕軌建設」　捷工局：納入規劃研議


桃園農產月曆封面主題「馬力食足」　11/22起限量索取

▲「2026桃園農產月曆」由市長張善政開箱亮相。（圖／市府提供）

記者楊淑媛／桃園報導

「2026桃園農產月曆」12日於市政會議，由市長張善政開箱亮相。張善政指出，今年農產月曆再度由「最佳唱片包裝設計獎」得主蕭青陽操刀；同時市府長期支持的中華職棒36年冠軍球隊－－樂天桃猿，也由副隊長梁家榮領銜，共14位主力球員拍攝形象照，用行動力挺並透過月曆宣傳桃園特色之美。

另外，2026桃園農產月曆11月22日起，將於桃園仙草嘉年華活動現場開放限量索取。張善政說，2026年版月曆依據民眾回饋調整版面，放大日期格方便長者書寫，兼具實用與美感。今年行銷也結合樂天桃猿職棒隊，以運動形象連結城市品牌，展現桃園活力與創意。

▲「2026桃園農產月曆」行銷結合樂天桃猿職棒隊。（圖／市府提供）

農業局長陳冠義表示，翻閱2026桃園農產月曆，就像一次走讀、品味整個大桃園的地理人文精華，月曆素材結合在地農產特色，像是拉拉山水蜜桃、象徵好事發生的柿子與花生，還有草莓、西瓜、洋香瓜、火龍果等時令水果；背景搭配的則有李騰芳古宅、中庄吊橋、三坑田園景觀、秀才登山步道、竹圍漁港、永安漁港觀光漁市等水彩畫，用圖說展現桃園之美。

2026桃園農產月曆以「馬力食足」為封面主題，寓意桃園五穀豐登、豐衣足食；延續2025農產月曆好評，連續第二年力邀蕭青陽老師操刀，集結藝術家陳俊華、張晉霖、張家荣、余思瑩、蔡岳霖及攝影師謝文創、蕭帷軒共同創作，將桃園農業的多樣與美麗，轉化為一幅幅動人的藝術作品。

農業局長陳冠義說明，「桃園好農」的長期合作夥伴-中職36年總冠軍樂天桃猿，也由副隊長梁家榮及林智平、余德龍、朱承洋、張閔勛、林承飛、成晉、王志煊、林政華、陳柏豪、莊昕諺、宋嘉翔、李勛傑、蘇俊璋等14位球員，分別選擇屬於自己的生日月份或幸運數字專屬月曆，拍下一系列宣傳照，希望藉由冠軍球員的魅力與影響力，讓更多人認識桃園特色。


▲桃園青年租屋，陳韋曄爭取桃園版分級加碼補貼。（圖／市議會國民黨團提供）

記者楊淑媛／桃園報導

桃園市議員陳韋曄12日在市議會定期大會市政總質詢，聚焦「青年、婦幼、長照」三大主題，爭取青年租屋補貼加碼、公托據點擴點、長者健檢及長照服務整合，強調市府都應打造一條完整的幸福支持鏈，讓市民從小到老都安心生活。

陳韋曄指出，目前桃園的青年租金補貼全由中央支應，市府尚未自籌經費加碼，與其他直轄市相比明顯落後。他舉例，台北市已推出「分級加碼」方案，新北市更結合「青銀共居」修繕補助最高可達1萬元。

他建議市府研擬推出「桃園版分級加碼補貼」試辦方案，並結合包租代管政策，讓5,000戶包租代管房源中預留部分比例給青年承租，「讓青年租得起，也租得到！」都發局長江南志表示，會納入後續研議。

在就業方面，陳韋曄肯定「安薪讚」計畫幫助年輕人穩定就業，但他也建議升級為「安薪讚2.0」，針對低收、中低收或有學貸壓力的青年，加碼分段獎勵，並與「青年脫貧專案」及育兒政策結合，形成跨局處整合支持機制。

另外，針對婦幼政策，陳韋曄肯定桃園的「好孕專車」補助全台最優，但建議取消單趟250元上限，並將使用期限延長至產後一年，讓孕媽咪能有更多彈性。他也呼籲市府與交通局合作，擴大「通用計程車」服務範圍，打造「無障礙好孕專車」，真正照顧到身障孕婦。婦幼局長杜慈容回應，目前暫不考慮打開單趟上限，期限研議會從現行7個月延長。

桃園市青年租屋　陳韋曄爭取「桃園版分級加碼補貼」試辦方案


▲勞動部桃竹苗分署開辦ESG課程助青年成綠領尖兵。（圖／桃竹苗分署提供）

記者楊淑媛／桃園報導

為響應全球淨零排放與綠色轉型趨勢，勞動部勞動力發展署桃竹苗分署與元智大學攜手成立「ESG永續與綠能科技人才發展基地」，規劃在年底前推出三大實務課程，包含「GRI永續報告書撰寫實務班」、「ESG數據分析與碳足跡報告書實務班（第二期）」及「永續商業模式數位轉型實務班」。

桃竹苗分署12日表示，課程期間自114年11月至115年3月，目前陸續開班招生中；訓練內容結合ESG理論與實務，從企業永續報告撰寫、碳盤查與中和技術、AI數據分析到綠色創新策略，全面培養學員永續專業能力，打造面向未來的「綠色職場新人才」，歡迎想要跨入綠色產業的待業民眾踴躍報名參訓。

▲ESG課程結訓後安排就業媒合活動。（圖／桃竹苗分署提供）

其中，「GRI永續報告書撰寫實務班」聚焦於國際GRI標準，強化學員在ESG報告撰寫、碳盤查及跨部門溝通的核心能力，結訓後可勝任「永續專員」、「CSR專案企劃」等新興職務；「ESG數據分析與碳足跡報告書實務班（第二期）」則以AI與資料科學為主軸，教授學員以Python進行數據分析、資料視覺化與溫室氣體盤查實作，並運用ChatGPT協助撰寫ESG報告，結合科技與永續的雙重專業；「永續商業模式數位轉型實務班」則著重於從管理決策到綠色創新實務，內容涵蓋企業倫理、永續治理、能源管理系統、SBTi倡議與碳路徑設計，協助學員理解如何將永續策略融入商業決策與品牌經營。

於課程期間通過測驗者，除可取得查證人員證書，更可獲輔導報考經濟部產業人才能力鑑定（iPAS）淨零碳規劃管理師證照，為職涯發展增添專業優勢。

曾參與「ESG數據分析與碳足跡報告書實務班（第一期）」的翁先生表示，大學畢業後長期從事業務工作，主要負責客戶經營與管理；看準綠色產業的發展潛力，他報名參加桃竹苗分署開設的職訓課程，學習碳盤查與ESG實務技能，訓練期間在導師的指導下，實作Python數據分析與自動化流程，培養了永續報告撰寫與資料整合能力。

結訓後，他透過就業媒合活動順利進入電腦軟體系統公司，擔任系統安全工程師，並將課程所學應用於工作中；翁先生表示，職訓課程內容實用，特別適合缺乏實務經驗的待業者，能幫助學員在訓練過程中充實專業能力，並熟悉職場需求。

勞動部桃竹苗分署推三大ESG實務課程　培育綠色職場新人才


打最後一場球給天上的外公看　李愷諺奪勝賽後哽咽落淚

▲國王主控李愷諺為日前離世的外公奮戰並拚下勝利。（圖／TPBL職籃提供）

記者杜奕君／綜合報導

在無預警更換總教練的不確定性下，新北國王12日主場面對福爾摩沙夢想家，靠著團隊末節上演逆襲戲碼，最終94比91贏球，不僅幫助代理主帥洪志善拿下執教首戰，也是近期2連勝。此戰砍下17分、6籃板、2抄截的國王主控李愷諺，賽後卻在記者會哽咽落淚，原因是日前照顧他長大的外公離世，李愷諺喊話，希望打這場球給天上的外公看。

國王昨日傳出新任總教練約翰在本季執教僅7場比賽下，確定去職消息，並由老將控衛洪志善暫代總教練職務，而團隊上下也喊話「快樂打球」，希望扭轉先前的低迷氣氛。

此戰國王雖在首節開打後取得短暫領先，但其後幾乎都一路落後給對手夢想家，不過末節靠著桑尼領軍下，最終國王以3分之差逆轉收勝。

此戰國王除了桑尼拿下26分、8籃板外，李愷諺也貢獻17分、6籃板、2抄截，正負值「+16」更是全場最佳表現。

李愷諺賽後記者會上一度哽咽，眼眶泛淚的他表示，「感謝隊友和教練幫我拿下這場勝利，我的外公在周一離開了，這可能是他最後一次看我打球，謝謝大家。」

李愷諺表示，「我從小都是爺爺奶奶和外公外婆帶大的，一切來得比較突然，原本和球隊請了一段時間的假，昨晚我趕回來，告訴自己要打最後一場球給外公看。」

國王贏球後目前戰績4勝4敗，排名重新衝回例行賽第3位，至於輸球的夢想家則為3勝5敗，目前排名例行賽第6位。

▲國王桑尼連兩戰用強勢表現帶領球隊拿下勝利。（圖／TPBL職籃提供）


80歲老母悶死「癱瘓50年兒」被判2年6個月　學者喊話總統特赦

▲劉姓老婦殺死悶死癱瘓50年兒被判刑，須文蔚喊話總統特赦。（圖／記者邱中岳翻攝／下同）

記者趙蔡州／綜合報導

台北市一名80歲劉姓老婦不堪照護全身癱瘓、長期臥床的腦麻兒子長達50年，身心俱疲之下，使用膠帶纏繞口鼻的方式將兒子悶死，一審法官審理後判處她2年6個月並建請總統特赦，案件上訴二審中。對此，台師大文學院院長須文蔚感嘆，這個事件是老婦的絕望與法官的悲憫，呼籲賴清德總統特赦。

須文蔚12日在臉書表示，針對劉姓老婦殺死兒子的事件，合議庭3位法官在審理時一定經歷了無比的掙扎，畢竟劉婦在犯行後，立即請家人報警，並在警方到場後坦承犯行，符合自首要件，最終法院以劉婦無前科紀錄、過往品行尚可且親屬均表示諒解及同情，判處劉婦2年6個月，並建請總統特赦。

須文蔚感嘆，這份判決，如同在冰冷的法條上淌下一滴溫熱的淚水，這份判決書也不再僅是法律的文書，更是對一位竭盡所能的母親的人道悲憫，這個案件不是簡單的「殺人案」，而是五十年沉重照護下，一個家庭的無聲崩潰，這份絕望已遠超個體的負荷，成為整個社會必須正視的集體困境，期待國家真正建立安全網，接住每一個絕望的照顧者。

須文蔚直言，希望網友可以分享他的這篇文章，同意3位法官的看法，建請總統考慮依《赦免法》規定，特赦劉婦，「法官的這份建請，是司法對行政權發出的最溫柔而沉痛的呼籲，是試圖在嚴峻的法治與人性的極限之間，尋求一條可以讓『合情、合理、合法』三者合一的道路」。

回顧事件，劉婦和兒子、外籍看護同住台北市松山區復興北路巷弄內1樓，兒子疑因疫苗後遺症，患有重度腦性麻痺，領有身心障礙證明，從小臥床無法自理生活已超過50個年頭，完全靠劉婦照料生活起居，直到劉婦年邁，家人才雇請外籍看護幫忙。

2023年4月間，劉婦因新冠肺炎確診，一度被隔離在長庚醫院，她擔心兒子狀況，急著要出院，因疫情管制鬆綁，終於可以回家自主隔離後，又見到兒子也確診，反覆發燒難受，開始覺得心力交瘁，想到自己年事已高，若先離世，病兒會成為其他親人的負擔。

劉婦為此煎熬多日沒睡，決定先送兒子一程，2023年5月11日下午，她先到住家附近油漆行買了1捆膠帶，並於隔天早上7點多趁外籍看護盥洗的空檔，進入兒子的房間並將門反鎖。

劉婦先拿出準備好的1萬元紅包塞進兒子嘴裡，希望兒子「好上路」，再以手巾摀住兒子口鼻後，用膠帶層層纏繞口鼻，接著就呆坐在一旁。此時，外籍看護發現劉婦不見了，兒子房間的門又反鎖，跑到外面從陽台窗戶看到老母親在房內痛哭，焦急地立刻通知劉婦的兒子們。

劉婦的兒子、媳婦接到通知，趕緊報警並回家協助開門，但腦麻兒因呼吸道阻塞引發窒息死亡不治，警方到場後，劉婦坦承所有犯行。


寶可夢首款沙盒遊戲售價近70美元...「鑰匙卡」形式網質疑食言

記者楊智仁／綜合報導

任天堂宣布《Pokémon Pokopia》將於 2026 年 3 月 5 日 正式發售，售價為 69.99 美元（日本售價為 8,980 日圓），並且將以「鑰匙卡」實體形式販售，此消息一出立即在玩家間引發熱議。

▼Pokémon Pokopia 於 2026 年 3 月 5 日發售 。（圖／翻攝自寶可夢）

官方商店頁面同步上線後，揭露遊戲價格與發行形式細節，《Pokémon Pokopia》美國已開放預購售價 69.99 美元、日本售價 8,980 日圓，與《瑪利歐賽車世界》相當，並高於《咚奇剛 蕉力全開》與《寶可夢傳說 Z-A》等作品。除此之外，任天堂日本官網標註《Pokopia》實體版為「鑰匙卡」形式，雖然美國官網尚未顯示相同資訊，但任天堂同步上傳一支 YouTube 教學影片，介紹「Switch 2 鑰匙卡運作方式」並以《Pokopia》作為範例。

「遊戲鑰匙卡」自從推出後就一直飽受爭議，「鑰匙卡」不同於傳統遊戲卡匣，內部不含完整遊戲資料，僅提供授權下載啟動碼，玩家購買後仍需連上網路才能下載遊戲，儘管鑰匙卡可轉售或與他人共享，不過與「完整實體卡」相比，玩家認為失去收藏與離線遊玩價值。

值得注意的是，任天堂過去曾聲明「不打算在自家開發的遊戲中使用鑰匙卡」，因此部分玩家認為這次做法等同「食言」。但由於《寶可夢》並非任天堂獨立擁有 IP，且開發方為光榮特庫摩，任天堂僅負責發行情況略有不同。不過，這仍是任天堂首次以鑰匙卡形式推出發行作品，被視為公司對新發行模式的試探性舉措。

任天堂同時宣布，《Pokopia》將在台灣 / 香港時間 11 月 13 日 22:00 於寶可夢官方 YouTube 頻道公開特別影片，有玩家發現，該影片長度可能超過 10 分鐘實機畫面，顯示任天堂對這款新作信心十足。


▲新北八里火警，屋內一女子無呼吸心跳。（圖／民眾提供）

記者陳以昇、柯振中／新北報導

新北市八里區中華路二段一棟15層住宅大樓12日晚間發生火警，消防局於22時42分接獲報案，指14樓傳出火勢與濃煙。消防人員獲報後立即出動，共派遣24輛消防車、60名人員趕赴現場搶救。火勢於稍後撲滅，不過屋內發現一名女子明顯無呼吸心跳，隨即由救護車送往淡水馬偕醫院急救。

根據新北市警方指出，現場為八里區中華路二段的一處社區大樓，火警發生時屋主疑失聯。警方除立即封鎖現場並協助交通管制外，亦通知鑑識人員進行火場勘驗。

▲▼新北八里火警，屋內一女子無呼吸心跳。（圖／民眾提供）

消防人員初步研判，起火點位於14樓住家內部，燃燒面積尚待估算。受困女子身分確認為61歲孫姓婦人，目前仍在醫院搶救中，詳細起火原因及肇事責任，正由消防與警方共同調查釐清。

警方與消防局呼籲，入夜使用電器應注意線路安全，避免長時間高負載使用，以防釀災，確保居家生命財產安全。

新北 淡水 八里 新北市 八里區

快訊／新北社區大樓深夜大火！一女子無呼吸心跳　送醫搶救中


國際火線／恐龍的後代：美國的「大法官之亂」


桃園市議員錢龍爭取「上南崁輕軌建設」　捷工局：納入規劃研議


桃園農產月曆封面主題「馬力食足」　11/22起限量索取


桃園市青年租屋　陳韋曄爭取「桃園版分級加碼補貼」試辦方案


勞動部桃竹苗分署推三大ESG實務課程　培育綠色職場新人才


太子集團洗錢案「豪宅總管」30萬交保！北檢提抗告遭駁回

▲太子集團洗錢案被告凃又文交保，北檢抗告遭駁回。（資料照／記者劉昌松攝）

記者柯振中／綜合報導

北檢偵辦柬埔寨太子集團在台疑涉洗錢，聲押五名在台幹部後，法院裁准四人羈押，「豪宅總管」凃又文則是以新台幣30萬元交保，檢方抗告遭高院駁回確定。

根據《中央社》報導，台灣高等法院合議庭審理後認為，凃姓被告涉參與犯罪組織與洗錢罪嫌重大，雖有逃亡風險，但卷內並無足以認定會串證或滅證的事證。原審以三十萬元交保並限制住居，已有相當強制效果，可作為羈押的替代手段，因而駁回檢方抗告，裁定確定。

台北地方法院早先審查時，已對其他四名被告裁定羈押禁見。北檢不服對凃姓被告之交保處分提出抗告，案件遂移由高院審理。北院另澄清，媒體報導中劉姓女特助被檢方具保候傳並以十五萬元交保，屬偵查階段檢方處置，與法院對凃姓被告之交保裁定性質不同。

案情顯示，太子集團由陳志等人在柬埔寨運作詐欺，疑以跨國企業網路洗錢。美國檢方已於10月對陳志等人提起公訴，美國財政部海外資產控制辦公室亦將相關在台公司與國人列入制裁名單。台北地檢署在接獲國際相關訊息後，於10月15日分案調查，並於11月4日指揮多單位實施搜索、拘提與約談。


▲勇士近期團隊內部似乎出現不小雜音，主帥柯爾直言球員對待比賽態度出現問題。（圖／路透）

記者杜奕君／綜合報導

金州勇士12日開啟客場6連戰之旅，在對上衛冕軍奧克拉荷馬雷霆之戰，雖然勇士一哥柯瑞（Stephen Curry）大病初癒回歸，但球隊球隊最終仍以102比126慘敗。賽後勇士也傳出「茶壺內風暴」，包括主帥柯爾（Steve Kerr）以及明星前鋒格林（Draymond Green）都點出問題，柯爾甚至直言表示，「感覺很不對勁，我們目前對待比賽的態度有問題！」

勇士今日終於迎接「咖哩大神」柯瑞回歸，不過此戰他整體狀況欠佳僅拿11分，勇士也一路挨打，最終以24分之差敗給強敵雷霆。

賽後勇士團隊從總教練到球員，似乎都針對現況出現不小的質疑及批評，球隊主帥柯爾表示，「感覺很不對勁！我們的比賽方式、對待比賽的態度都有問題。」

主力前鋒格林則強調，「每個球員都有私心，但你必須讓你的私心在團隊框架內發揮作用，如果行不通，那你就得放棄你的私心，否則你的私心最終會導致你被球隊給放棄。」

「士官長」巴特勒（Jimmy Butler）受訪時則說道，「每個人都需要坦然面對自我，必須為團隊及大局做出犧牲，展現更強的鬥志，讓球隊重回勝利軌道。」

勇士此戰輸球後，戰績為6勝6敗，目前排名西區第9位，也面臨5成勝率保衛戰。

勇士驚傳茶壺風暴！　主帥柯爾批：對待比賽態度有問題


BWF盤點戴資穎最經典12場戰役　總決賽10比19絕境逆轉安洗瑩

台灣 泰國 印尼 馬來西亞 新加坡 中國 印度 丹麥

▲BWF官網盤點戴資穎生涯最經典的12場戰役。（圖／翻攝自BWF官網，下同）

記者游郁香／綜合報導

台灣球后戴資穎上周正式宣布退休，BWF連續多天發文向她致敬，今晚精選出小戴生涯12場經典戰役，讓球迷再次回味她獨一無二的高超球技與創造力。

2014年杜拜超級系列年終總決賽決賽：勝成池鉉 21-17、21-12

這是小戴在年終總決賽奪下的第1座冠軍，成為台灣史上第1人。前1年，小戴曾在決賽失利。儘管在小組賽不敵山口茜，但在準決賽輕取印度一姐賽娜（Saina Nehwal），決賽則直落2擊敗成池鉉，展現成熟的比賽掌控力。

2016年印尼公開賽決賽：勝王儀涵 21-17、21-8

這一周，小戴完成了罕見的壯舉，連續擊敗當時中國3大女將：李雪芮、王適嫻與王儀涵。這場勝利確立了小戴在國際賽場上的統治地位，也是她首次在頂超賽事封后。

2017年馬來西亞公開賽決賽：勝馬琳（Carolina Marin） 23-25、22-20、21-13

前兩局的爭奪異常激烈。小戴在第2局救回關鍵分後，成功將比賽拖入決勝局，並在第3局中段掌握節奏，最終逆轉奪冠。

2018年丹麥公開賽決賽：勝賽娜 21-13、13-21、21-6

小戴過去曾4連敗給賽娜，但自此之後，她徹底扭轉對戰紀錄，在接下來的16次交手中贏了15次。這場決賽第3局，她的假動作與變化球幾乎讓對手無法預測。這一站封后後，小戴正式進入「10萬分俱樂部」。

2018年雅加達亞運決賽：勝印度名將辛度（Pusarla V. Sindhu） 21-13、21-16

這是小戴首度在超級系列／世界巡迴賽以外的舞台摘冠，全程直落2擊敗每一位對手，包括張雁宜、奧原希望、賽娜與辛度，氣勢如虹，替我國進帳首面亞運羽球金牌。

2019年新加坡公開賽準決賽：勝山口茜 15-21、24-22、21-19

這場比賽展現小戴堅韌的一面。第2局面臨5個賽點，她全數化解，最終以極細微的差距逆轉勝出，堪稱經典之戰。

2020年BWF世界巡迴賽總決賽（泰國曼谷）決賽：勝馬琳 14-21、21-8、21-19

疫情期間，3場連續在曼谷舉行的賽事讓小戴與馬琳3度在決賽碰頭。前兩次馬琳皆勝出，並在這場比賽末段再度領先，但小戴在最關鍵時刻發揮最佳狀態，逆轉奪冠，為這場驚心動魄的決賽畫下完美句點。

2023年BWF世界巡迴賽總決賽準決賽：勝安洗瑩 19-21、21-15、22-20

這場比賽讓人見識小戴驚人的韌性，決勝局一度以10比19落後，但小戴在絕境中硬是打出12比1猛攻，完成幾乎不可能的逆轉勝。

2020東京奧運決賽：負陳雨菲 18-21、21-19、18-21

這可能是小戴生涯最令人心碎的一戰。雖首局落後，但在第2局打出絕佳表現。決勝局中她一度因非受迫失誤亂了節奏，尾段再度展現韌性，最終仍以微差飲恨。全場歷時81分鐘，成為經典之戰。

2021年世界羽球錦標賽準決賽：勝何冰嬌 21-17、13-21、21-14

前一日小戴擊敗辛度，確定進帳生涯首面世錦賽獎牌。面對曾在前一屆淘汰她的何冰嬌，小戴成功復仇，闖進決賽。可惜在決賽對山口茜時，未能發揮最佳表現，以直落2落敗，錯失世錦賽金牌。

2020年全英公開賽決賽：勝陳雨菲 21-19、21-15

這是小戴的第2座全英冠軍，意義重大。此前一年，她曾在兩次決賽中輸給陳雨菲，也曾在2019年全英決賽落敗，這次勝利等於成功復仇。

2023年亞洲羽球錦標賽決賽：勝安洗瑩 21-10、21-14

這場勝利再次證明，小戴依舊能與新世代球星抗衡。當時世界女單已形成「4強格局」，小戴、安洗瑩、山口茜與陳雨菲並駕齊驅，而小戴以絕對實力壓制對手，奪下冠軍。


80歲老母悶死「癱瘓50年兒」被判2年6個月　學者喊話總統特赦


新北 淡水 八里 新北市 八里區

快訊／新北社區大樓深夜大火！一女子無呼吸心跳　送醫搶救中


太子集團洗錢案「豪宅總管」30萬交保！北檢提抗告遭駁回


打最後一場球給天上的外公看　李愷諺奪勝賽後哽咽落淚


勇士驚傳茶壺風暴！　主帥柯爾批：對待比賽態度有問題


BWF盤點戴資穎最經典12場戰役　總決賽10比19絕境逆轉安洗瑩

新加坡 中國 印度 丹麥 印尼 馬來西亞 台灣 泰國


米蘭2025年11月12日 /美通社/ — 全球智能越野車與互聯騎行系統創新者Segway Powersports最近在2025年米蘭國際摩托車展(EICMA 2025)發布了全新AT10 W MUD全地形車。這款車型專為深泥地、濕地和林道等複雜地形設計，兼顧強勁動力與智能操控，幫助愛好者與專業用戶在極端環境中行駛的更遠，並且保持卓越的操控性與信心。

AT10 W MUD搭載97馬力高性能動力系統，提供強勁即時的動力輸出，並通過寬輪距設計提升穩定性，320毫米離地間隙可輕鬆跨越樹根與巖脊障礙。標配4500磅電動絞盤，在遇到超出預期的深坑或水窪時，可提供可靠的自救能力。整車具備最高1米涉水深度，並採用優化的進氣路徑、電氣防護與排水系統設計，可在多次深泥或積水浸泡後仍保持穩定運行。

其多項組件與配件可靈活定制，適用於全年不同季節的多樣化用途。專為泥地設計的輪胎與堅固的底盤結構保證了卓越的抓地力與車身穩定性，從而提升騎行體驗。用戶可根據需要加裝除雪鏟以適應冬季作業，並可選配底盤防護、後保險槓與貨物儲物裝置，以增強整車的耐用性與載重靈活度，滿足高頻與重載使用場景。優化的冷卻系統布局可有效減少長時間騎行過程中傳遞至駕駛者的熱量，從而顯著提升長時工作或休閒騎行的舒適性。

智能化是AT10 W MUD體驗以及所有Segway Powersports產品的核心特徵之一。騎行者可連接Smart Moving App智能騎行應用，啟用導航與通訊功能，通過越野地圖引導實時可視化路線，並可連接藍牙耳機或頭盔通訊系統，保持全程互聯。

AT10 W MUD擁有多種功能，可滿足不同類型用戶的多樣化需求。對於土地管理者與林業作業團隊而言，其可靠的動力輸出與卓越的路線適應性是極具吸引力的優勢。對於周末越野愛好者，車輛能夠在深泥與複雜狹窄地形中保持出色的操控性與穩定性，讓騎行既刺激又安心。對於競技級騎手，AT10 W MUD經過精細調校，可在抓地力與視野最具挑戰的賽段中持續保持強勁動能與穩定表現。

除AT10 W MUD外，Segway Powersports還在本屆EICMA展會上展示了豐富的產品陣容，涵蓋全地形車、多用途與運動型並排越野車以及公路系列產品。這一產品陣容充分體現了該公司對高強度車架、精密動力系統、電子助力轉向及以騎手為核心的軟件技術的持續投入，彰顯了其在戶外運動車輛領域的核心技術實力與獨特且尖端的產品。

關於Segway Powersports

Segway自1999年推出革命性的個人代步車以來，徹底改變了微出行領域，激發了全球對未來個人交通方式的無限想象。秉承「Simply Moving（讓出行更簡單）」的使命，Segway致力於簡化人和物的移動方式，提升效率並改善日常生活體驗。數十年來，Segway不斷在短途交通與消費級機器人領域樹立行業新標桿，持續推動技術創新的邊界。如今，Segway以突破性技術引領未來出行趨勢，推出創新產品，重新定義人們的出行方式。

請訪問：https://powersports.segway.com。

Segway Powersports在2025年米蘭國際摩托車展推出AT10 W MUD


IBM 發表全新量子處理器、軟體與演算法

全力推進量子優勢與大規模量子容錯量子電腦

新的 IBM Quantum Nighthawk (代號：夜鷹) 量子處理器，專為實現量子優勢而設計，可執行複雜度增加30%的電路。IBM 偕同合作夥伴貢獻三項實驗成果給一個由開放社群主導的量子優勢機制，挑戰現行主導的傳統模擬方法。全新 IBM Qiskit展示動態電路的準確度提高 24%，並透過由高效能運算 (HPC) 驅動的誤差緩解技術，使取得準確結果的成本降低100 倍以上。IBM Quantum Loon (代號：潛鳥) 展示了容錯型量子運算所需要的所有硬體元件高效能量子糾錯的解碼速度提升 10 倍，比原計畫時程提前一年完成。IBM將在其 300mm晶圓製造工廠加速開發與製造其量子晶圓。同時將量子晶片複雜度提升 10 倍，以支援發展量子容錯糾錯能力。

台北2025年11月12日 /美通社/ — IBM今日在年度量子開發者大會上公布對於在2026年底前實現量子優勢、以及在2029年推出容錯型量子電腦等創新的重要進展。IBM 研究院院長暨 IBM 院士 (IBM Fellow) Jay Gambetta 表示，「要讓量子技術真正為世人所用，需要眾多努力齊頭並進。IBM 是唯一能夠快速創新、同時發展量子軟體、硬體、生產製造及糾錯技術，實現量子實際應用的公司。」

IBM 將於2026年實現量子優勢

IBM 推出迄今最先進的量子處理器 IBM Quantum Nighthawk （代號：夜鷹），以搭配高效能量子軟體，將於2026年實現量子優勢。（量子優勢：量子電腦能以優於所有單純使用傳統運算技術的方式解決問題）

IBM Quantum Nighthawk 將於 2025 年底問世，具備下列能力：

120 個量子位元（qubits），以 218 個新一代可調耦合器連接四個最近的量子位元，形成正方形晶格；耦合器數量比 IBM Quantum Heron 增加20% 以上。量子位元連接性增加，讓使用者在保持低錯誤率之餘，可執行複雜度增加 30% 的電路。此架構支持多達 5,000 個雙量子位元閘（two-qubit gates），它是量子運算裡關鍵的糾纏運行，適用於對於運算力需求高的議題。

預計下一個版本的 Nighthawk 在2026 年底可支援 7,500 個雙量子位元閘，2027 年達10,000 個；以 Nighthawk為基礎的系統預計在2028 年可支持15,000 個雙量子位元閘，藉由2024年首次在實驗型量子晶片上首次展示的長距離耦合器，連接1,000或更多的量子位元。

IBM 預期第一批經過社群驗證的量子優勢案例將於 2026 年底公布。為了促進嚴謹驗證並推動最佳量子與傳統運算方法，IBM 與 Algorithmiq、Flatiron Institute 及 BlueQubit 正在將最新創新成果貢獻給一個由開放社群主導的量子優勢機制，供全球有系統地檢視與驗證。

上述量子優勢的追蹤機制目前支持三個實驗專案，目的是探索量子優勢在可觀測估計、變分問題、和具有高效經典驗證的問題方面的應用。IBM 鼓勵全球量子社群將創新成果貢獻給這個機制，雙向交流以找出最佳方法取得量子優勢。

為了在全新的量子硬體上取得經過驗證的量子優勢，開發人員需要能夠高度控制電路，並使用高性能運算 (HPC) 以減少運算中出現的錯誤。

IBM Qiskit 是 全球效能最高、由IBM 開發的量子軟體堆棧。透過強化動態電路功能，Qiskit提供開發人員前所未有的控制能力：在超過 100 個量子位元的規模下，準確度提高了 24%。Qiskit 並增加了新的運行模型，能夠實現細粒度控制和 C-API，提升由HPC 驅動的錯誤消除功能，將取得準確結果的成本降低 100 倍以上。

隨著量子電腦日趨成熟，全球量子社群的研究方向正在拓展到高效能運算和科學領域。IBM 為 Qiskit 提供一個由 C-API 支援的 C++ 接口，使用者可以在現有的高效能運算環境中，進行量子運算的原生編程。IBM 繼續在先進的電路運作能力領域保持領先，包括動態電路和增加對電路運作的控制以減少錯誤。

IBM 計畫在2027 年透過機器學習與優化等領域的運算庫來擴展 Qiskit，更有效地研究與解決微分方程式和哈密頓模擬等基礎物理和化學難題。

IBM 展示研發容錯量子運算所需的基礎硬體元件

此外，IBM目標在 2029 年推出世界上第一台大規模的容錯量子電腦。

IBM 今天同時推出 IBM Quantum Loon （代號：潛鳥）實驗型處理器，首次展示 IBM 已經具備發展容錯量子運算所需的一切關鍵處理器元件。IBM Loon 將驗證一項新的架構，以開發和擴展實用級、高效能量子糾錯所需要的元件。IBM 展示了預備納入 Loon 的創新能力，包括引入多個高品質、低損耗的路由層，為更長距離的片上連接（或「c 耦合器」）提供路徑，超越最近鄰耦合器，將同一晶片上的遠距離量子位元以物理型態連接起來，以及在運算之間重置量子位元的技術。

IBM 亦提升了研發容錯型量子運算的另一項關鍵能力，即使用傳統運算硬體，以 qLDPC 碼準確地實時（少於 480 奈秒）解碼錯誤。這項工程成就比原計劃提前一年完成。搭配 Loon，這展示了在高速、高保真度的超導量子位元上擴展 qLDPC 程式碼所需要的基礎；這些超導量子位元正是 IBM 量子電腦的核心。

IBM加速開發與製造量子晶圓

除了不斷提升其量子電腦的能力，IBM 也宣布其位於紐約州阿爾巴尼奈米科技園區、生產300mm晶圓的工廠，將成為製造其量子晶圓的主力。園區內先進的半導體製造系統與全天候運作機制，已經加速 IBM 學習、改善與延伸其量子處理器功能，使 IBM 不斷提升其量子位元的連接能力、精密度與效能。時至今日，IBM 已經能夠：

提升研發速度一倍；推出每個新處理器的時程減半；提升量子晶片的物理複雜度達十倍；同時探索與進行多重研發項目

新聞聯絡IBM 公司公關部 Kate Liu kateliu@cn.ibm.com


〔中央社〕市場預計美國政府關門危機即將落幕，並對美國聯邦準備理事會（Fed）再次降息抱持樂觀態度，歐洲主要股市今天收紅。

倫敦FTSE 100指數上漲11.82點或0.12%，收報9911.42點。

法蘭克福DAX指數揚升293.40點或1.22%，收在24381.46點。

巴黎CAC 40指數上揚85.01點或1.04%，收8241.24點。（編譯：陳正健）1141113

一手掌握經濟脈動 點我訂閱自由財經Youtube頻道

免費訂閱《自由體育》電子報熱門賽事、球星動態不漏接

美政府關門危機有望落幕  歐股收紅


〔中央社〕路透社獨家報導，4名消息人士透露，美國通用汽車公司（General Motors）已指示數千家供應商，要求在供應鏈裡排除中國零件。

這些消息人士表示，通用汽車高層要求供應商，為原料與零件尋找中國以外的替代來源，目標是最終完全撤出中國。其中一些消息人士指稱，部分供應商被要求在2027年前結束與中國的採購關係。

此外，這些消息人士還提及，通用汽車自2024年底起就已陸續通知部分供應商，隨著今年春季美中貿易戰升溫，這項行動變得更加急切。據悉，通用高層表示，此舉是為了提升公司的供應鏈「韌性」。

汽車業者與供應商已開始擴大在美國生產，以因應美國總統川普（Donald Trump）推動在美投資與就業的政策。

但產業高層指出，他們也感覺到，美中關係已出現長期且跨黨派的變化，部分企業正解除數十年來與中國建立的關係。（編譯：陳正健）1141113

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路透：通用汽車要求零件供應商　撤出中國供應鏈