The Immigration Bureau reported yesterday that over the past three years a total of 16,819 Chinese citizens have been discovered to be in bogus marriages with Taiwanese.
Chinese citizens, who were determined by immigration authorities to be in false marriages constituted 12.6 percent of the 133,305 Chinese citizens who have sought to enter the country as the spouses of Taiwanese nationals between Sept. 1, 2003 and Oct. 31, Immigration Bureau officials said at the Legislative Yuan.
Approval was granted to a total of 103,367, or 77.5 percent, of the Chinese citizens who applied and underwent interviews to enter the country as spouses during that time, the officials said while presenting a written report on the bureau's operations on managing applications by Chinese citizens.
According to the written report, the bureau has operated 39 interview rooms in Taipei, Kaohsiung, Taichung and Hualien, as well as at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport and Kaohsiung International Airport, and on the outlying islands of Kinmen and Matsu, which lie closer to China's Fujian Province than to Taiwan.
To stave off an influx of Chinese immigrants through marriages of convenience, the Immigration Bureau under the National Police Administration implemented a personal interview system for incoming Chinese spouses starting on Sept. 1, 2003.
Some of the Chinese citizens who were determined to be in bogus marriages with Taiwanese citizens were immediately repatriated while some underwent a second round of interviews after their entry into Taiwan, during which it was determined that they were in marriages of convenience, bureau officials said.
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