In a bid to crack down on illegal immigrants and the smuggling of mainland Chinese to the US, authorities are set to increase rewards for reporting illegal immigrants and people-smuggling rings, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday.
Under a new bill, the interior ministry will offer NT$1,000 to NT$5,000 to anyone who turns in a foreign worker who has overstayed his or her visa.
The reward for reporting an illegal immigrant is from NT$5,000 to NT$20,000, ministry spokesman Ho Jung-tsun said.
Anyone who reports a people-smuggling ring can receive NT$20,000 to NT$100,000, he said.
The bill will become effective on Jan. 1, 2001, after being passed through the legislature.
Lured by its wealth, a growing number of migrants from China are sneaking into Taiwan to find work. Many foreign workers go into hiding after their three-year contract has expired.
Some mainlanders who enter Taiwan to visit sick relatives also overstay their visas and work illegally, in order to earn money to send home.
Taiwan denies entry to mainlanders unless they are invited by civic groups or come here to attend family funerals or to visit sick relatives.
The combined effect of the monsoon, the outer rim of Typhoon Fengshen and a low-pressure system is expected to bring significant rainfall this week to various parts of the nation, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The heaviest rain is expected to occur today and tomorrow, with torrential rain expected in Keelung’s north coast, Yilan and the mountainous regions of Taipei and New Taipei City, the CWA said. Rivers could rise rapidly, and residents should stay away from riverbanks and avoid going to the mountains or engaging in water activities, it said. Scattered showers are expected today in central and
People can preregister to receive their NT$10,000 (US$325) cash distributed from the central government on Nov. 5 after President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday signed the Special Budget for Strengthening Economic, Social and National Security Resilience, the Executive Yuan told a news conference last night. The special budget, passed by the Legislative Yuan on Friday last week with a cash handout budget of NT$236 billion, was officially submitted to the Executive Yuan and the Presidential Office yesterday afternoon. People can register through the official Web site at https://10000.gov.tw to have the funds deposited into their bank accounts, withdraw the funds at automated teller
COOPERATION: Taiwan is aligning closely with US strategic objectives on various matters, including China’s rare earths restrictions, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Taiwan could deal with China’s tightened export controls on rare earth metals by turning to “urban mining,” a researcher said yesterday. Rare earth metals, which are used in semiconductors and other electronic components, could be recovered from industrial or electronic waste to reduce reliance on imports, National Cheng Kung University Department of Resources Engineering professor Lee Cheng-han (李政翰) said. Despite their name, rare earth elements are not actually rare — their abundance in the Earth’s crust is relatively high, but they are dispersed, making extraction and refining energy-intensive and environmentally damaging, he said, adding that many countries have opted to
PEACE AND STABILITY: Maintaining the cross-strait ‘status quo’ has long been the government’s position, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Taiwan is committed to maintaining the cross-strait “status quo” and seeks no escalation of tensions, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday, rebutting a Time magazine opinion piece that described President William Lai (賴清德) as a “reckless leader.” The article, titled “The US Must Beware of Taiwan’s Reckless Leader,” was written by Lyle Goldstein, director of the Asia Program at the Washington-based Defense Priorities think tank. Goldstein wrote that Taiwan is “the world’s most dangerous flashpoint” amid ongoing conflicts in the Middle East and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He said that the situation in the Taiwan Strait has become less stable