Former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator Diane Lee’s (李慶安) attorney said the US’ latest explanation of its laws on loss of citizenship backs Lee’s claim that she legally lost her US citizenship when she took public office in Taiwan more than a decade ago.
Lee Yung-jan (李永然) was referring to a Jan. 16 letter from the American Institute in Taiwan’s (AIT) Washington office that stated loss of US citizenship occurs when a citizen “voluntarily commits a statutorily defined potentially expatriating act with the intention of relinquishing US citizenship.”
Lee Yung-jan said Diane Lee’s taking of an oath of allegiance to the Republic of China (ROC) when she took office as a Taipei City councilor in 1994 and her use of her ROC passport to enter and exit the US since then were concrete acts that proved her intent to give up her US citizenship.
PHOTO: CHU PEI-HSIUNG, TAIPEI TIMES
“We believe that the latest AIT letter marks a favorable development in the case,” he said.
Diane Lee’s case is on the agenda of the Central Election Commission’s meeting today. It must decide whether her election to public office prior to last year should be nullified. She was sworn in for a fourth legislative term on Feb. 1 last year.
The following month, however, it was discovered that she had never formally renounced her US citizenship, although she had held public office in Taiwan since 1994.
She resigned on Jan. 8 just as groups of civic organizations were preparing to besiege the legislature to protest its failure to act against her.
The Nationality Act (國籍法) requires public officials holding dual citizenship to surrender their foreign citizenship before assuming public office and to obtain a certificate as proof that they had complied with the act within one year of taking office.
The law also requires that those officials who retain foreign citizenship be removed from their posts.
Calls for Diane Lee to be formally relieved of her seat mounted after US authorities, in response to an inquiry from Taiwan, confirmed late last year that she “has previously been documented as a US citizen with a US passport and that no subsequent loss of US citizenship has been documented.”
But in a letter dated Nov. 22 to Taiwan’s representative office in Washington, AIT managing director Barbara Schrage wrote that US citizens serving in a foreign government “may have committed an expatriating act if they do so with the intent to relinquish their US nationality.”
Schrage wrote that while the US Department of State has not made any determination regarding loss of citizenship for any individual Taiwanese lawmaker, “it could do so based on evidence that he or she committed a potentially expatriating act with the intention of relinquishing US nationality.”
Central Election Commission Secretary-General Teng Tien-yu (鄧天祐) said earlier this week that the commission had asked the US to clarify whether Taiwanese lawmakers or city councilors would automatically lose their status as US citizens once they take an oath of office in Taiwan, and whether they need to apply to relinquish their citizenship or have US authorities invalidate their US citizenship.
In a terse letter dated Jan. 16, Schrage replied that as stated in her previous letter, “loss of US citizenship occurs when a citizen voluntarily commits a statutorily defined potentially expatriating act with the intention of relinquishing US citizenship,” political sources said.
Democratic Progressive Party legislators have filed a complaint with the Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office accusing Lee of forgery and fraud.
They alleged that by holding dual citizenship while in public office, Lee defrauded state coffers of more than NT$100 million (US$2.97 million) in salary as a Taipei City councilor between 1994 and 1998 and as a legislator from 1999 to last month, and they demanded that she return the “illicit gains.”
Lee has been barred from leaving the country pending prosecutorial investigations.
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it
Taiwan's Gold Apollo Co (金阿波羅通信) said today that the pagers used in detonations in Lebanon the day before were not made by it, but by a company called BAC which has a license to use its brand. At least nine people were killed and nearly 3,000 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members detonated simultaneously across Lebanon yesterday. Images of destroyed pagers analyzed by Reuters showed a format and stickers on the back that were consistent with pagers made by Gold Apollo. A senior Lebanese security source told Reuters that Hezbollah had ordered 5,000 pagers from Taiwan-based Gold Apollo. "The product was not
COLD FACTS: ‘Snow skin’ mooncakes, made with a glutinous rice skin and kept at a low temperature, have relatively few calories compared with other mooncakes Traditional mooncakes are a typical treat for many Taiwanese in the lead-up to the Mid-Autumn Festival, but a Taipei-based dietitian has urged people not to eat more than one per day and not to have them every day due to their high fat and calorie content. As mooncakes contain a lot of oil and sugar, they can have negative health effects on older people and those with diabetes, said Lai Yu-han (賴俞含), a dietitian at Taipei Hospital of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. “The maximum you can have is one mooncake a day, and do not eat them every day,” Lai