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One of the top stories from this past week was the dramatic hostage crisis that unfolded at a prison in the southern city of Kaohsiung. The crisis ended after 14 hours with six armed inmates committing suicide by shooting one another.
The inmates had seized weapons from the armory at a prison in Kaohsiung a day before, and took the warden and a head guard hostage. Those hostages were not harmed in incident.
The inmates, who were serving sentences for various crimes, including drug offenses, robbery, and murder, had demanded a getaway car. They said they were unhappy about the unlikelihood of their release.
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Also this past week, Taiwan’s top China policymaker, Wang Yu-chi, announced his resignation. Wang’s decision on Tuesday came after a court ruling cleared a former deputy of leaking sensitive information to mainland China.
Wang objected to the ruling but said he respected the court’s decision. He decided to step down to take responsibility for forcing the former deputy to resign last year on suspicions that the deputy had leaked secrets.
The former deputy, Vincent Chang, had been under investigation since last August on allegations that he had leaked information to China. But prosecutors said there was insufficient evidence of that.
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And finally, this past week, Taiwan has ranked above all other Asian nations in the latest World Press Freedom Index.
The index was released on Thursday by France-based Reporters Without Borders (RSF). Taiwan finished 51st among 180 countries and regions, outperforming South Korea in 60th place, Japan in 61st place, and Hong Kong in 70th place. China was one of the bottom performers, in 176thplace.
The top five countries in the index were Finland, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Sweden.