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Police complain of increased burden

Accommodation for illegal Chinese immigrants has strained Taipei police stations financially and has become a management problem, a Taipei City councilor said yesterday.

Tai Hsi-chin (戴錫欽) said in a press conference that with the rising number of illegal Chinese immigrants, the existing detention center in Hsinchu is no longer able to accommodate them and some of them are being held in local police stations, which do not have sufficient funds to deal with the problem.

Tai said that he has visited police precincts in Taipei and has conducted an investigation through the use of questionnaires. The central government provided more than NT$3 million (US$87,976) for food, daily necessities, medical treatment and miscellaneous payments for illegal immigrants in the first eight months of this year, far short of the required amount, he said.

He said 13 out of the 14 Taipei police precincts have to pay out as much as NT$45,000 from their own budgets for the funding shortfall every month.

Furthermore, the additional workload requires more personnel, he said. The detention rooms in police precincts are overcrowded and not intended to be used as shelters for illegal immigrants, some of whom are locked up for months.

Officials from Tatung and Ta-an precincts said some of the illegal immigrants are engaged in the sex trade and are infected with venereal disease. Most of the illegal immigrants are women and they need clothes, sanitary items and medical treatment.

Female police officers manage the illegal immigrants for just six days per month, but sometimes they still need additional support, the officials said.

The most troublesome aspect is the emotional management, the officials said, adding that when one illegal immigrant cries due to homesickness, the others are affected and all may burst into tears.
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