The uncle of Taiwanese-Brazilian boy Iruan Ergui Wu (
Kaohsiung Judge Liao Cheng-hsiung (
PHOTO: SU FU-NAN, TAIPEI TIMES
"The Wus will have to bring Iruan to the Kaohsiung District Court in person," Liao said.
Liao, accompanied by court clerks, police officers and Brazil Business Center Director Paulo Pinto, arrived at Wu's Kaohsiung residence yesterday morning to receive the boy.
Pinto was acting as Ergui's legal representative.
When the group arrived, Wu Huo-yen refused to hand over the boy, insisting that Ergui should have come to Taiwan to pick him up.
Wu Huo-yen's lawyer, Wu Chiu-li (
Liao gave a new deadline of Monday and handed another official notice to Wu Huo-yen, which he refused to sign.
According to Liao, if the family fails to hand over the boy by the new deadline, Wu Huo-yen will be arrested and put in jail until Iruan is escorted to Brazil.
Liao has the option to fine the Wu family NT$30,000 to NT$300,000 should they resist attempts to repatriate the boy and has the power to order police to use force to take Iruan.
The refusal to comply with the court order demanding Iruan's return upset Pinto.
"This is absurd. Are you kidding me or what?" he said.
Pinto was supposed to pick up Iruan and take an evening flight to Porto Alegre, Brazil.
The Kaohsiung District Court said the official notice was mailed on Dec. 23 last year and was signed by Wu Huo-yen's sister-in-law, Chen Hsiu-yen (
To ensure that Wu Huo-yen received the notice, the court mailed another official notice on Jan. 5 to the local police station and officers delivered the notice to Wu Huo-yen in person.
According to the Civil Code, judges are authorized to carry out a court order 11 to 30 days after the arrival of the official notice. The period ended Thursday night.
In addition to claiming that he did not receive official notice from the court, Wu Huo-yen said he wants to see two things happen.
"We hope that Ergui can come in person. If she has monetary problems, we are more than happy to help. If not, we hope that we can ask somebody we know to escort Iruan back to Brazil. We will be worried if we turn him over to someone we barely know," Wu Huo-yen said.
Meanwhile, Javier Hou (
The US government has signed defense cooperation agreements with Japan and the Philippines to boost the deterrence capabilities of countries in the first island chain, a report by the National Security Bureau (NSB) showed. The main countries on the first island chain include the two nations and Taiwan. The bureau is to present the report at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee tomorrow. The US military has deployed Typhon missile systems to Japan’s Yamaguchi Prefecture and Zambales province in the Philippines during their joint military exercises. It has also installed NMESIS anti-ship systems in Japan’s Okinawa
‘WIN-WIN’: The Philippines, and central and eastern European countries are important potential drone cooperation partners, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung said Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) in an interview published yesterday confirmed that there are joint ventures between Taiwan and Poland in the drone industry. Lin made the remark in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper). The government-backed Taiwan Excellence Drone International Business Opportunities Alliance and the Polish Chamber of Unmanned Systems on Wednesday last week signed a memorandum of understanding in Poland to develop a “non-China” supply chain for drones and work together on key technologies. Asked if Taiwan prioritized Poland among central and eastern European countries in drone collaboration, Lin
Renewed border fighting between Thailand and Cambodia showed no signs of abating yesterday, leaving hundreds of thousands of displaced people in both countries living in strained conditions as more flooded into temporary shelters. Reporters on the Thai side of the border heard sounds of outgoing, indirect fire yesterday. About 400,000 people have been evacuated from affected areas in Thailand and about 700 schools closed while fighting was ongoing in four border provinces, said Thai Rear Admiral Surasant Kongsiri, a spokesman for the military. Cambodia evacuated more than 127,000 villagers and closed hundreds of schools, the Thai Ministry of Defense said. Thailand’s military announced that
CABINET APPROVAL: People seeking assisted reproduction must be assessed to determine whether they would be adequate parents, the planned changes say Proposed amendments to the Assisted Reproduction Act (人工生殖法) advanced yesterday by the Executive Yuan would grant married lesbian couples and single women access to legal assisted reproductive services. The proposed revisions are “based on the fundamental principle of respecting women’s reproductive autonomy,” Cabinet spokesperson Michelle Lee (李慧芝) quoted Vice Premier Cheng Li-chiun (鄭麗君), who presided over a Cabinet meeting earlier yesterday, as saying at the briefing. The draft amendment would be submitted to the legislature for review. The Ministry of Health and Welfare, which proposed the amendments, said that experts on children’s rights, gender equality, law and medicine attended cross-disciplinary meetings, adding that