The nation should consider improving its commitment to the "movement of natural persons" and should further liberalize practices in the field, a Taiwan official said in Geneva yesterday.
The "movement of natural persons" -- one of the service trade areas that members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) have strenuously tried to improve since the trade boy came into force in January 1995 -- refers to the entry and temporary stay of persons for the purpose of providing a service. It does not relate to persons seeking citizenship, permanent employment or permanent residence in a country.
Lin Chia-cheng (
Both Lin and Yen agreed that Taiwan should improve its commitment on the movement of natural persons and should voluntarily open its doors wider to foreign lawyers, doctors, accountants and architects, as part of the efforts to further liberalize the country's service sector.
Lin said that although the nation currently allows foreign lawyers and accountants to carry out some of their practices in Taiwan, they are not allowed to prepare accounts or certificates for audit, or work on architecture projects.
Lin noted that if the nation were to further liberalize short-term work by foreign lawyers, doctors, accountants and architects, it could trigger opposition and resistance from local practitioners in the short term. But he said that in the long run the opening would benefit the country's overall development.
Yen echoed Lin's remarks, saying that while gradual liberalization in the country's industrial sector has helped rev up the country's economic development and has increased its trade benefits, the service sector -- which constitutes 67 percent of Taiwan's gross domestic product -- has not been sufficiently liberalized to reflect the WTO's free-trade spirit.
Prosecutors in New Taipei City yesterday indicted 31 individuals affiliated with the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) for allegedly forging thousands of signatures in recall campaigns targeting three Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers. The indictments stem from investigations launched earlier this year after DPP lawmakers Su Chiao-hui (蘇巧慧) and Lee Kuen-cheng (李坤城) filed criminal complaints accusing campaign organizers of submitting false signatures in recall petitions against them. According to the New Taipei District Prosecutors Office, a total of 2,566 forged recall proposal forms in the initial proposer petition were found during the probe. Among those
ECHOVIRUS 11: The rate of enterovirus infections in northern Taiwan increased last week, with a four-year-old girl developing acute flaccid paralysis, the CDC said Two imported cases of chikungunya fever were reported last week, raising the total this year to 13 cases — the most for the same period in 18 years, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday. The two cases were a Taiwanese and a foreign national who both arrived from Indonesia, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The 13 cases reported this year are the most for the same period since chikungunya was added to the list of notifiable communicable diseases in October 2007, she said, adding that all the cases this year were imported, including 11 from
China might accelerate its strategic actions toward Taiwan, the South China Sea and across the first island chain, after the US officially entered a military conflict with Iran, as Beijing would perceive Washington as incapable of fighting a two-front war, a military expert said yesterday. The US’ ongoing conflict with Iran is not merely an act of retaliation or a “delaying tactic,” but a strategic military campaign aimed at dismantling Tehran’s nuclear capabilities and reshaping the regional order in the Middle East, said National Defense University distinguished adjunct lecturer Holmes Liao (廖宏祥), former McDonnell Douglas Aerospace representative in Taiwan. If
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) today condemned the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) after the Czech officials confirmed that Chinese agents had surveilled Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) during her visit to Prague in March last year. Czech Military Intelligence director Petr Bartovsky yesterday said that Chinese operatives had attempted to create the conditions to carry out a demonstrative incident involving Hsiao, going as far as to plan a collision with her car. Hsiao was vice president-elect at the time. The MAC said that it has requested an explanation and demanded a public apology from Beijing. The CCP has repeatedly ignored the desires
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