Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers are re-proposing a draft bill on refugees.
Lawmakers tabled a draft bill on refugees in the previous legislative session, aiming to address international human rights, but it met opposition from the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus that cost the bill a chance to be discussed and reviewed.
DPP legislators Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴), Tsai Yi-yu (蔡易餘) and Yu Mei-nu (尤美女) have each proposed a version of the draft legislation on refugees, which have been referred for further deliberation in the Internal Administration Committee, and the Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee.
The Ministry of the Interior in 2005 put forward a draft refugee act, but it failed to secure passage in the legislature.
In the previous legislative session, which commenced in 2012, the Executive Yuan’s version of the draft legislation excluded Chinese and Tibetan refugees seeking asylum from the act. Hsiao and other DPP lawmakers tabled their own version, including such groups of political refugees, but it was not put to committee review.
In 2013, a version of the draft act was proposed by lawmakers across party lines, including KMT Legislator Apollo Chen (陳學聖) and DPP lawmakers. The bill was referred to the committee for review, but the session ended without the bill being put on the review agenda.
Hsiao and Yu have re-proposed the bill, along with Tsai, a newly elected lawmaker.
The three versions tabled by Hsiao, Yu and Tsai are similar, with all three having clear rules on specifying what the act is for, conditions of asylum, how refugees are defined, identification, protection and assistance for refugees, distinction between territorial and extraterritorial asylum, and the establishment of an asylum system.
Hsiao said that although Taiwan is not a member of the UN, as a member of the international community, it should make efforts to shoulder the international responsibility as other nations do, providing persecuted groups with protection, assistance and other humanitarian aid.
Yu has drafted her version of the bill with the assistance of human rights groups, aiming to work with the government in ensuring protection for refugees and stateless people within a fair, effective, appropriate and comprehensive legal framework.
Tsai said in his proposal that as regional conflicts worsen and China’s persecution of dissidents continues, Taiwan is lagging behind in its legal protection for politically persecuted refugees and in supporting immigration measures, having allowed only a few exiled Chinese dissidents to remain in Taiwan as special, one-off cases.
The three lawmakers said that insofar as Taiwan ratified two international human rights conventions in 2009 and the enforcement act was passed in the legislature, it should institutionalize the proposed protection for asylum seekers and thereby fulfill a promise that the nation is to be governed with human rights as a guiding principle.
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