The Ministry of the Interior’s proposed amendments to the Nationality Act (國籍法) would fail to guarantee the naturalization rights of foreign nationals, civic groups said yesterday, demanding the full repeal of discriminatory provisions.
About 20 campaigners from the Taiwan International Family Mutual Help Association, Taiwan TransAsia Sisters’ Association and other immigrant advocacy groups gathered outside of the Legislative Yuan, shouting for the legislature to remove the “shackles” migrants face when naturalizing.
“The current law allows for our citizenship to be stripped at any time within the first five years for any kind of a police record — even a speeding ticket,” the Taiwan TransAsia Sisters’ Association’s Yadrung Chiu said.
“Government discretion to strip our citizenship is not fair because we have already gone through an extremely rigorous review process, including proving that we had no criminal record in the past,” she said. “A citizen is a citizen — if the government does not have the right to strip native Taiwanese of their citizenship, we should not be treated differently.”
Because foreign spouses are required to give up their native citizenship before naturalizing, being stripped of Taiwanese citizenship makes them stateless, leaving them in an administrative “black hole” if their relationship with their Taiwanese spouse ends because of death or divorce, she said.
A woman originally from Thailand named Tiponda said she had been stripped of citizenship after the broker who arranged her marriage was accused of fraud in cases involving other couples, and that she had forfeited her only opportunity to appeal because she did not understand that the appeal had to be filed within a week.
The death of her husband the same year ended any possibility of renaturalizing, she said.
“When I go to the Thai representative office, they say they cannot help me because I am Taiwanese now, but when I go to the National Immigration Agency, they say I am Thai,” she said, adding that she could only extend her resident rights in three month increments, making it nearly impossible for her to find stable employment, as well as making her ineligible for National Health Insurance.
Wong Lennon (汪英達), the director of the Serve the People Association’s service center and shelter for migrant workers, blasted the draft legislation for giving the government the right to strip new citizens of legal residency, as well as citizenship, if they fail to prove they have given up their original citizenship within a year, saying that the legislation perpetuated double standards on dual citizenship.
“The Taiwanese government in practice allows for dual citizenship by Taiwanese nationals, but still refuses to allow foreigners to maintain their original citizenship,” he said.
“We have to spend five years before getting a national ID card, but even after we get it, we still do not have the same rights as Taiwanese,” said Melisa Huang (黃麗莎), originally from Indonesia, criticizing draft legislation for failing to drop requirements that naturalized citizens wait 10 years before standing for public office.
Taiwanese can file complaints with the Tourism Administration to report travel agencies if their activities caused termination of a person’s citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday, after a podcaster highlighted a case in which a person’s citizenship was canceled for receiving a single-use Chinese passport to enter Russia. The council is aware of incidents in which people who signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of Russia were told they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, Chiu told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Taipei. However, the travel agencies actually applied
New measures aimed at making Taiwan more attractive to foreign professionals came into effect this month, the National Development Council said yesterday. Among the changes, international students at Taiwanese universities would be able to work in Taiwan without a work permit in the two years after they graduate, explainer materials provided by the council said. In addition, foreign nationals who graduated from one of the world’s top 200 universities within the past five years can also apply for a two-year open work permit. Previously, those graduates would have needed to apply for a work permit using point-based criteria or have a Taiwanese company
The Shilin District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday indicted two Taiwanese and issued a wanted notice for Pete Liu (劉作虎), founder of Shenzhen-based smartphone manufacturer OnePlus Technology Co (萬普拉斯科技), for allegedly contravening the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例) by poaching 70 engineers in Taiwan. Liu allegedly traveled to Taiwan at the end of 2014 and met with a Taiwanese man surnamed Lin (林) to discuss establishing a mobile software research and development (R&D) team in Taiwan, prosecutors said. Without approval from the government, Lin, following Liu’s instructions, recruited more than 70 software
BACK TO WINTER: A strong continental cold air mass would move south on Tuesday next week, bringing colder temperatures to northern and central Taiwan A tropical depression east of the Philippines could soon be upgraded to be the first tropical storm of this year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday, adding that the next cold air mass is forecast to arrive on Monday next week. CWA forecaster Cheng Jie-ren (鄭傑仁) said the first tropical depression of this year is over waters east of the Philippines, about 1,867km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), and could strengthen into Tropical Storm Nokaen by early today. The system is moving slowly from northwest to north, and is expected to remain east of the Philippines with little chance of affecting Taiwan,
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