Several legislators and women's groups are calling for reform of Taiwan's divorce laws and the introduction of "no-fault" divorce.
In Taiwan, a couple can obtain a divorce in two ways, either by mutual agreement or through a ruling in the courts on the grounds of adultery, cruelty, confinement in prison, physical incapacity or several other "faults."
With the divorce rate on the rise -- it jumped from 0.62 percent in 1978 to 2 percent in 1998 -- some people think it is too easy to get divorced in Taiwan.
Women's rights activists, however, disagree that it is too easy to obtain a divorce through the courts.
Both sides of the debate were presented during a public hearing on the issue at the Legislative Yuan yesterday that was attended by Ying Chih-hung (
Divorce by agreement, a device unique to Taiwan, is said to have made it too easy to end a marriage.
"Buy a divorce agreement from a stationery store, get two friends to sign it attesting to how unbearable your marriage is and then sign your own names on the documents -- that's all you have to do to end a marriage," said legislator Ying, who was a practicing lawyer in the US.
"It's easy for a couple to get very irrational during a quarrel. But a divorce agreement signed under such circumstances could often leave both of them regretting it for the rest of their lives," he said.
On the other hand, women's rights activists, who have long pressed for relaxing the existing restrictions on divorce, think going through the courts for a "fault" divorce is often too hard for some women.
"Many compare modern marriage to an instant meal, which comes and goes quickly. But that's only partially true," said Chen Mei-hua (
"The process of getting married could be like having an instant meal. But getting a divorce is quite another story. Until the day they actually get divorced, a lot of women have tasted bitter meals of adultery or violence," she said.
"Some people say it's not a good thing to have more and more couples divorcing each year. But is it a good thing to see the very poor conditions persist in lots of marriages?" Chen asked.
Normally in any divorce request, the "non-fault" spouse is required to present concrete evidence of their partner's marital misconduct. To many people's relief, however, a number of recent court decisions have made a divorce possible even though none of the fault grounds was alleged.
Putting less emphasis on "proof of fault," these courts have granted divorce requests on the basis of a legal provision that allows a divorce when a marriage is no longer sustainable for "important reasons" other than the marital conduct referred to in the law.
However, the results of court rulings often vary from one judge to another because of their diverse views on marriage. And so there have often been cases where a divorce request is granted by a district court judge only to be dismissed later by a High Court judge.
Huang Shan-shan (黃珊珊), a Taipei city councilor and a divorce lawyer, said she found that the subjectivity of judges very much affects their decisions on divorce requests.
"The gap has to be bridged by setting standards for the judges. We're hoping the judges won't make decisions based on their own views about marriage, but based on factual conditions of the marriages [in the divorce cases before them]," Huang said.
One way to remedy the situation might be the introduction of "no-fault" divorce, which would be handled by the courts, but would not require one spouse to prove the "guilt" of the other.
The Awakening Foundation and other women's groups have long called for such a move.
Ying is one of the legislators who wants to overhaul the current system and introduce no-fault divorce.
At yesterday's hearing, he promised to draft legislation to allow for no-fault divorces.
Under pressure from women's groups, Taiwan's divorce law has been amended several times in recent years. The last amendment was made in September 1996, when the regulations were changed to give mothers an equal chance at winning custody of their children after a divorce.
Prior to the change, custody was almost always granted to the father or the father's family.
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
BEIJING’S ‘PAWN’: ‘We, as Chinese, should never forget our roots, history, culture,’ Want Want Holdings general manager Tsai Wang-ting said at a summit in China The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday condemned Want Want China Times Media Group (旺旺中時媒體集團) for making comments at the Cross-Strait Chinese Culture Summit that it said have damaged Taiwan’s sovereignty, adding that it would investigate if the group had colluded with China in the matter and contravened cross-strait regulations. The council issued a statement after Want Want Holdings (旺旺集團有限公司) general manager Tsai Wang-ting (蔡旺庭), the third son of the group’s founder, Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明), said at the summit last week that the group originated in “Chinese Taiwan,” and has developed and prospered in “the motherland.” “We, as Chinese, should never
INDO-PACIFIC REGION: Royal Navy ships exercise the right of freedom of navigation, including in the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, the UK’s Tony Radakin told a summit Freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific region is as important as it is in the English Channel, British Chief of the Defence Staff Admiral Tony Radakin said at a summit in Singapore on Saturday. The remark came as the British Royal Navy’s flagship aircraft carrier, the HMS Prince of Wales, is on an eight-month deployment to the Indo-Pacific region as head of an international carrier strike group. “Upholding the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and with it, the principles of the freedom of navigation, in this part of the world matters to us just as it matters in the
‘A SURVIVAL QUESTION’: US officials have been urging the opposition KMT and TPP not to block defense spending, especially the special defense budget, an official said The US plans to ramp up weapons sales to Taiwan to a level exceeding US President Donald Trump’s first term as part of an effort to deter China as it intensifies military pressure on the nation, two US officials said on condition of anonymity. If US arms sales do accelerate, it could ease worries about the extent of Trump’s commitment to Taiwan. It would also add new friction to the tense US-China relationship. The officials said they expect US approvals for weapons sales to Taiwan over the next four years to surpass those in Trump’s first term, with one of them saying
RSS