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Crackdown reveals fake lama scams

The government's recent move to tighten screening on visa applications from citizens of Nepal has revealed a dearth of problematic applications by Chinese Tibetan lamas holding fake Nepalese IDs seeking entry into the country.

Statistics showed that 10 percent of all entry visa applications by Tibetan monks holding Nepalese passports applications were fraudulent, the Bureau of Consular Affairs under the foreign ministry said.

There are about 1,500 such applications each year, the bureau said.

The bureau last year started to notice a surge of entry applications from Chinese lamas with Nepalese passports.

Chinese citizens who wish to travel to Taiwan are supposed to apply for entry permits from the National Police Agency's Immigration Office, which can take up to three months to be approved.

Sources from the consular authorities said one of the reasons for such rampant counterfeiting of Nepalese IDs was because it was relatively cheap to buy a fake Nepalese passport, which cost less than NT$100,000 (US$3,030).

The authorities even suspect that organized counterfeiting of Nepalese passports was being conducted from Nepal's consular office in Beijing.

"We discovered that a number of these fake Nepalese passports were issued in Beijing but while we couldn't find any record of these people ever going to Nepal, Nepal's consular office in Beijing was able to provide such travel records for these individuals," a consular official speaking on condition of anonymity told the Taipei Times.

Another method frequently used by Chinese Tibetan monks to obtain Nepalese IDs was by using the foster relationship between Nepalese parents that are adopted by the Chinese lamas, the official said.

According to Nepalese government requirements, any individual intending to apply for a Nepalese passport must be able to speak Nepalese. Furthermore, it normally takes 10 years for an adopted child of foreign origin to obtain a Nepalese ID.

"In many cases, we found applications by Chinese monks were fraudulent because these people couldn't speak Nepalese at all when they were quizzed by our consular staff," the official said.

In other cases, the official found a single Nepalese passport was being used by up to three Chinese monks, with each of them changing the name on the passport when applying for the visa.

The official noted that the regular entry visas issued to Tibetan lamas allows for a maximum stay of two months.

However, authorities also discovered an increasing number of monks were overstaying their visas, with some even staying for up to three years before requesting permanent residence.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs Spokesman Michel Lu (呂慶龍) urged Chinese monks to apply for entry through the proper channels (the Immigration Office), which last year alone issued 100 or so such visas to Chinese Tibetans.

Other countries experiencing similar problems have also adopted a tougher stance when reviewing visa applications from Nepalese. Hong Kong decided to stop issuing visas to Nepalese altogether.

Foreign ministry officials said since the authorities tightened the screening for Nepalese visa applications last year, there had been a gradual reduction in fraudulent applications.

"We still welcome Tibetan lamas who come to Taiwan, as most of them enter the country legally and offer spiritual services needed by people here," the consular official said.

"There are about 500,000 Tai-wanese followers of Tibetan Buddhism. There is quite a demand for Tibetan monks to come to Taiwan. I don't think we'll take such drastic measures like Hong Kong and shut the door on these lamas," the official said.
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