The deportation of Chinese academic Li Yi (李毅), who has promoted the use of force to unify Taiwan and China, was justified, as it is illegal to advocate war, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday.
“If the government failed to deport him, it would have been negligent in its duty,” MAC Deputy Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) told a legislative hearing on creating institutional mechanisms to oversee the signing of cross-strait agreements, citing the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which was adopted by Taiwan as domestic law in 2009 and states that “any propaganda for war shall be prohibited by law.”
Li would also have been in breach of the terms of his tourist visa if he had given a scheduled speech at a pro-unification rally in Taichung on Saturday, which was canceled, the National Immigration Agency has said.
On Saturday, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said that Taiwan had no reason to allow Li to stay and he constituted a national security threat.
Li was deported on Friday, three days after his arrival in Taiwan.
At yesterday’s hearing, Chiu said Li was dealt with in accordance with the law, based on his comments, which advocated military action against Taiwan that could wreck the lives of the people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait.
Any foreign nationals who make similar remarks would be listed as persona non grata and their applications to enter Taiwan would be closely scrutinized, Chiu said.
The government’s efforts to build institutional mechanisms to oversee cross-strait political negotiations and the inking of cross-strait pacts are vital to interactions and Taiwan’s security and well-being, Chiu said.
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