Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) members and a labor affairs analyst debated yesterday the number of Chinese workers who might come to Taiwan after the recently signed service trade agreement between Taiwan and China takes effect.
The debate began with former DPP legislator Julian Kuo’s (郭正亮) commentary on Sunday, in which he warned the DPP against citing incorrect data to claim that the pact would cause an influx of as many as 360,000 Chinese migrant workers.
Kuo cited statistics provided by the National Immigration Administration (NIA) as saying that only 216 Chinese executives or professionals entered Taiwan last year, while Chinese-invested firms have hired 6,771 Taiwanese, which means incoming Chinese investment has benefited the local job market.
Kuo also said the government only issues one-year visas to Chinese workers and requires that they are renewed annually, rather than granting unlimited residence rights, as the DPP had said.
The NIA data appeared to have only covered personnel transfers in multinational corporations, one of three categories of personnel flows stipulated in the cross-strait service trade agreement, said Honigmann Hung (洪財隆), director of the DPP’s Department of China Affairs.
The other categories are professionals and businesspeople, Hung said, adding that the government has three regulations on each of the three categories, upon which the DPP’s criticism was based.
For example, he said, two Chinese workers are allowed residence in Taiwan after an initial investment of US$200,000, with another worker being admitted after an additional investment of US$500,000.
Hung said the DPP’s criticism was legitimate.
Taiwan Labor and Social Policy Research Association executive director Chang Feng-yi (張烽益) echoed Hung, saying that the NIA’s data only included personnel transfers in multinational corporations.
According to the data Chang provided, about 75,000 applications were approved by the NIA for Chinese businesspeople with about 150,000 application approved for Chinese who entered Taiwan as professionals.
That means at least 220,000 Chinese workers entered and stayed in Taiwan last year, Chang said.
The manufacture of the remaining 28 M1A2T Abrams tanks Taiwan purchased from the US has recently been completed, and they are expected to be delivered within the next one to two months, a source said yesterday. The Ministry of National Defense is arranging cargo ships to transport the tanks to Taiwan as soon as possible, said the source, who is familiar with the matter. The estimated arrival time ranges from late this month to early next month, the source said. The 28 Abrams tanks make up the third and final batch of a total of 108 tanks, valued at about NT$40.5 billion
Two Taiwanese prosecutors were questioned by Chinese security personnel at their hotel during a trip to China’s Henan Province this month, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday. The officers had personal information on the prosecutors, including “when they were assigned to their posts, their work locations and job titles,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesman Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said. On top of asking about their agencies and positions, the officers also questioned the prosecutors about the Cross-Strait Joint Crime-Fighting and Judicial Mutual Assistance Agreement, a pact that serves as the framework for Taiwan-China cooperation on combating crime and providing judicial assistance, Liang
A group from the Taiwanese Designers in Australia association yesterday represented Taiwan at the Midsumma Pride March in Melbourne. The march, held in the St. Kilda suburb, is the city’s largest LGBTQIA+ parade and the flagship event of the annual Midsumma Festival. It attracted more than 45,000 spectators who supported the 400 groups and 10,000 marchers that participated this year, the association said. Taiwanese Designers said they organized a team to march for Taiwan this year, joining politicians, government agencies, professionals and community organizations in showing support for LGBTQIA+ people and diverse communities. As the first country in Asia to legalize same-sex
MOTIVES QUESTIONED The PLA considers Xi’s policies toward Taiwan to be driven by personal considerations rather than military assessment, the Epoch Times reports Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) latest purge of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) leadership might have been prompted by the military’s opposition to plans of invading Taiwan, the Epoch Times said. The Chinese military opposes waging war against Taiwan by a large consensus, putting it at odds with Xi’s vision, the Falun Gong-affiliated daily said in a report on Thursday, citing anonymous sources with insight into the PLA’s inner workings. The opposition is not the opinion of a few generals, but a widely shared view among the PLA cadre, the Epoch Times cited them as saying. “Chinese forces know full well that
RSS