City sidewalks just got a whole lot safer. Students of the Taipei European School's French Section were presented yesterday with their “permis piéton,” the French term for pedestrian license, by the French Institute in Taipei (IFT), signifying their mastery of road safety and self-protection.

The Ministry of Justice (MOJ) yesterday said in regard to the shooting death of a Taiwanese fisherman that the ministry and the Philippines have reached a consensus to conduct indirect questioning of relevant personnel.

Taiwan's Tourism Bureau launched a campaign in Hawaii Wednesday to promote the country's summer landscape, particularly around the Tropic of Cancer, which bisects the island.

The chairman of the Manila Economic and Cultural Office (MECO) said Tuesday in a letter to Taiwan's Foreign Ministry that he never mentioned Manila's “one China policy” in connection with the Philippines' attack on a Taiwanese fishing boat.

The ongoing diplomatic row between Taiwan and the Philippines would have been alleviated had Manila adopted a more apologetic stance from the beginning, Kenneth Weinstein, head of a U.S. think tank, said yesterday.

Spokesman for the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in Washington Frank Yee Wang recently told The Washington Times that the military exercise is a response to the public furor in Taiwan over the fisherman's killing. He said the drill is not intended as a provocation, “it was just to show to our people that our government will protect their rights in our waters.”

The southern boundary for Taiwan's fishery protection is not a “temporary enforcement line,” a Ministry of the Interior (MOI) official said yesterday, adding that it is the right of the Fisheries Agency (FA) — not the MOI — to decide if it needs to be revised.

The United States is hoping to see the early release of final investigation reports on the fatal shooting of a Taiwanese fisherman by a Philippine coast guard patrol, a U.S. State Department official said yesterday.

A detained Taiwanese fishing boat and its captain were released by Japanese authorities yesterday after trespassing into Japanese waters off Ishigaki Island, Taiwan's Fisheries Agency said yesterday.

President Ma Ying-jeou yesterday held a welcoming ceremony for Paraguay President Dr. Federico Franco at Liberty Square, and thanked him for his support of the East China Sea Peace Initiative.