Taipei - Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou Wednesday ruled out an intended visit next year by Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama.

"The Dalai Lama has visited Taiwan twice, and we generally welcome all religious leaders to visit, but at the current moment, the timing isn't appropriate for that," he told foreign media in Taipei.

He declined to say when the visit might be welcomed, but political observers said Ma was apparently reluctant to displease China by hosting the Dalai Lama as cross-strait relations have improved.

Taipei - Taiwan's professional baseball league plans to make a new start in 2009 following a game-fixing scandal, the league said on Monday.

At a team managers' meeting, the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL) reiterated its resolve to crack down on game fixing.

The CPBL now has four teams after the T-Rex team was dissolved in October over game-fixing and the Whales were disbanded in early November due to a lack of funds.

The CPBL urged the remaining four teams to prepare for the selection of players before the start of the baseball season on March 28, 2009.

Taipei - Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (TSMC), the world's largest contract chipmaker, on Monday revised down its fourth-quarter production target owing to the global recession.

"The company now expects fourth-quarter revenue to be between 63 billion and 65 billion Taiwan dollars (1.9 billion-1.96 billion US dollars), instead of the previous expectation of 69 billion-71 billion Taiwan dollars," TSMC said in a statement.

Taipei - Taiwan's China Airli

Taipei- Taiwan and China will hold the last round of consultations next week to prepare for launching direct shipping in mid-December, a newspaper said Saturday.

The United Daily News (UDN) said that China's Cross-Strait Shipping Association will send a delegation to Taiwan on December 2 to discuss technicalities of direct shipping with Taiwan's shipping officials.

During the eight-day visit, the delegation will hold talks with its Taiwan counterparts on the details of direct shipping as well as disputes between the two sides.