Long Awaited Panda Cub Born in Taiwan

A onetime gift from China to Taiwan is multiplying: Yuan Yuan, a 9-year-old female giant panda, gave birth to a female cub last night, reports the Global Times. She had been artificially inseminated in March, the seventh time in three years, and the unnamed female cub is her first. Beijing gave Yuan Yuan and mate Tuan Tuan, whose names together mean "reunion," to Taiwan in 2008 to mark warming relations. The panda pair are much beloved in Taiwan, notes the AP, and Yuan Yuan's long awaited pregnancy had been closely watched. (More Yuan Yuan stories.)