The Ministry of the Interior will next month begin interviewing couples in which one spouse is a foreigner to better understand their situations and gauge what assistance they might need.
"According to our statistics, 280,756 foreign spouses, both brides and grooms, will be included in the interview process," said Hsieh Ai-ling (
The home interviews, which will start on Nov. 7, are part of a ministry project called "Foreign and Chinese spouses living situation investigation program in 2003."
"Our goal is to understand the living situations of foreign spouses to provide further assistance if needed, that's all," Hsieh said.
In August, the ministry conducted a trial run of the project in Keelung City, Kaohsiung County and Penghu County.
The project will now include the whole country, including Kinmen and Matsu.
About 5,300 village and borough wardens and officials from local population offices will conduct the interviews to find out: basic profiles of foreign spouses and their Taiwanese spouses; the condition of the marriage; how many children they have; their living, financial and work situation; medical needs and guidance needs.
In each region, city and county governments will supervise the interviewers and reviewers, who will analyze the results.
The ministry has asked for the cooperation of foreign spouses and their family members in this interview process.
An increase in Taiwanese boats using China-made automatic identification systems (AIS) could confuse coast guards patrolling waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast and become a loophole in the national security system, sources familiar with the matter said yesterday. Taiwan ADIZ, a Facebook page created by enthusiasts who monitor Chinese military activities in airspace and waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast, on Saturday identified what seemed to be a Chinese cargo container ship near Penghu County. The Coast Guard Administration went to the location after receiving the tip and found that it was a Taiwanese yacht, which had a Chinese AIS installed. Similar instances had also
GOOD DIPLOMACY: The KMT has maintained close contact with representative offices in Taiwan and had extended an invitation to Russia as well, the KMT said The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) would “appropriately handle” the fallout from an invitation it had extended to Russia’s representative to Taipei to attend its international banquet last month, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday. US and EU representatives in Taiwan boycotted the event, and only later agreed to attend after the KMT rescinded its invitation to the Russian representative. The KMT has maintained long-term close contact with all representative offices and embassies in Taiwan, and had extended the invitation as a practice of good diplomacy, Chu said. “Some EU countries have expressed their opinions of Russia, and the KMT respects that,” he
VIGILANCE: The military is paying close attention to actions that might damage peace and stability in the region, the deputy minister of national defense said The People’s Republic of China (PRC) might consider initiating a hack on Taiwanese networks on May 20, the day of the inauguration ceremony of president-elect William Lai (賴清德), sources familiar with cross-strait issues said. While US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s statement of the US expectation “that all sides will conduct themselves with restraint and prudence in the period ahead” would prevent military actions by China, Beijing could still try to sabotage Taiwan’s inauguration ceremony, the source said. China might gain access to the video screens outside of the Presidential Office Building and display embarrassing messages from Beijing, such as congratulating Lai
Four China Coast Guard ships briefly sailed through prohibited waters near Kinmen County, Taipei said, urging Beijing to stop actions that endanger navigation safety. The Chinese ships entered waters south of Kinmen, 5km from the Chinese city of Xiamen, at about 3:30pm on Monday, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement later the same day. The ships “sailed out of our prohibited and restricted waters” about an hour later, the agency said, urging Beijing to immediately stop “behavior that endangers navigation safety.” Ministry of National Defense spokesman Sun Li-fang (孫立方) yesterday told reporters that Taiwan would boost support to the Coast Guard