The Legislative Yuan needs to resolve a number of issues, such as how the law defines a refugee, before it can draft a law extending refugee status to Hong Kong residents, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) said on Sunday.
Lee made the remarks in reponse to Hong Kong democracy advocate Joshua Wong’s (黃之鋒) call on Saturday for Taiwan to legislate a refugee act following the arrests of several democracy advocates in the territory.
Asked about Wong’s call, Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) on Sunday said that Taiwan has a robust democracy with sufficient laws, seemingly in reference to the Act Governing Relations with Hong Kong and Macau (香港澳門關係條例), which stipulates that people from Hong Kong and Macau could apply for temporary or permanent residency in Taiwan if they meet one of 16 conditions in the act.
Photo courtesy of the Taiwan Association for Human Rights
Article 18 of the act states: “Necessary assistance shall be provided to Hong Kong or Macau residents whose safety and liberty are immediately threatened by political reasons.”
A draft refugee law was first proposed on July 14, 2016, which was intended to offer asylum to stateless people fleeing war or natural disaster.
An alternative version of the draft was also put forward by the New Power Party (NPP) in December 2017.
Both bills passed their initial readings, but were sent to review committees before discussion by legislators, Lee said, adding that this had caused problems for the proposals.
The drafts were discussed in the context of the Nationality Act (國籍法), but issues such as who qualifies as a refugee and how many should be accepted were not discussed, he said.
The Nationality Act also requires people to abandon their original citizenship to become Republic of China (ROC) citizens, he said, adding that in the past Hong Kong protesters applying for ROC citizenship were handled on a case-by-case basis, similar to how applications by people from Tibet are processed.
The challenge with helping Hong Kong protesters through a refugee act is that under the ROC Constitution, it is not clear whether Hong Kong is considered part of national territory, and treating them as People’s Republic of China citizens makes it difficult to distinguish them from any other Chinese citizens from a legal perspective, he said.
According to the Mainland Affairs Council, Hong Kong and Macau are considered as special regions of the ROC.
More discussion of the issue among lawmakers is needed, he said.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip William Tseng (曾銘宗) said that the KMT caucus “hopes ‘all sides’ could respect Hong Kong’s freedoms and democracy,” and that it supports offering “a suitable level of assistance” to Hong Kongers.
Whether to include Hong Kong in a refugee act still has to be deliberated by the Executive Yuan and lawmakers, he said.
The highly political nature of including Hong Kong in a refugee act means the issue should be handled prudently, but handling cases individually under existing laws would not be a problem, he said.
NPP Chairman Hsu Yung-ming (徐永明) said that Hong Kong was not the focus of the party’s version of the draft refugee act.
The NPP had simply hoped that Taiwan would do more “preparations toward becoming a more democratic and civilized nation,” he said.
Hsu echoed the sentiments of other lawmakers that more discussion of whether to include Hong Kong in a refugee act was needed.
He urged discussion to proceed soon before circumstances in Hong Kong take a “dramatic turn” for the worse.
CHIP WAR: The new restrictions are expected to cut off China’s access to Taiwan’s technologies, materials and equipment essential to building AI semiconductors Taiwan has blacklisted Huawei Technologies Co (華為) and Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯), dealing another major blow to the two companies spearheading China’s efforts to develop cutting-edge artificial intelligence (AI) chip technologies. The Ministry of Economic Affairs’ International Trade Administration has included Huawei, SMIC and several of their subsidiaries in an update of its so-called strategic high-tech commodities entity list, the latest version on its Web site showed on Saturday. It did not publicly announce the change. Other entities on the list include organizations such as the Taliban and al-Qaeda, as well as companies in China, Iran and elsewhere. Local companies need
CRITICISM: It is generally accepted that the Straits Forum is a CCP ‘united front’ platform, and anyone attending should maintain Taiwan’s dignity, the council said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday said it deeply regrets that former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) echoed the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) “one China” principle and “united front” tactics by telling the Straits Forum that Taiwanese yearn for both sides of the Taiwan Strait to move toward “peace” and “integration.” The 17th annual Straits Forum yesterday opened in Xiamen, China, and while the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) local government heads were absent for the first time in 17 years, Ma attended the forum as “former KMT chairperson” and met with Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference Chairman Wang Huning (王滬寧). Wang
CROSS-STRAIT: The MAC said it barred the Chinese officials from attending an event, because they failed to provide guarantees that Taiwan would be treated with respect The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Friday night defended its decision to bar Chinese officials and tourism representatives from attending a tourism event in Taipei next month, citing the unsafe conditions for Taiwanese in China. The Taipei International Summer Travel Expo, organized by the Taiwan Tourism Exchange Association, is to run from July 18 to 21. China’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokeswoman Zhu Fenglian (朱鳳蓮) on Friday said that representatives from China’s travel industry were excluded from the expo. The Democratic Progressive Party government is obstructing cross-strait tourism exchange in a vain attempt to ignore the mainstream support for peaceful development
DEFENSE: The US would assist Taiwan in developing a new command and control system, and it would be based on the US-made Link-22, a senior official said The Ministry of National Defense is to propose a special budget to replace the military’s currently fielded command and control system, bolster defensive resilience and acquire more attack drones, a senior defense official said yesterday. The budget would be presented to the legislature in August, the source said on condition of anonymity. Taiwan’s decade-old Syun An (迅安, “Swift Security”) command and control system is a derivative of Lockheed Martin’s Link-16 developed under Washington’s auspices, they said. The Syun An system is difficult to operate, increasingly obsolete and has unresolved problems related to integrating disparate tactical data across the three branches of the military,
RSS