A Chinese couple accused of disrupting a pro-democracy event in Taipei organized by Hong Kong residents has been deported, the National Immigration Agency said in a statement yesterday afternoon.
A Chinese man, surnamed Yao (姚), and his wife were escorted by immigration officials to Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport, where they boarded a flight to China before noon yesterday, the agency said.
The agency said that it had annulled the couple’s entry permits, citing alleged contraventions of the Regulations Governing the Approval of Entry of People of the Mainland Area into the Taiwan Area (大陸地區人民進入台灣地區許可辦法).
Photo copied by Chen Yu-fu, Taipei Times
The couple applied to visit a family member in Taiwan at the end of last month, but the person they intended to visit had returned to China in July, the agency said.
The Chinese nationals were aware they were contravening the rules when they applied for temporary entry permits based on visiting family members living in Taiwan, it said.
In a separate statement issued yesterday, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) denounced the couple, accusing them of “abusing” the immigration system.
Photo: Taipei Times
However, the MAC did not explain why government agencies had failed to detect any problems with the application when it was submitted.
The government would review future applications “more strictly,” it said.
The breach of the immigration rules only surfaced after they were accused of disrupting a pro-democracy event in Taipei’s Ximending (西門町) area organized by a group of Hong Kong residents on Tuesday evening.
The Oct. 1 Action Team said in a statement on Wednesday that its flag, which featured the protest slogan “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times,” had been thrown on the ground by one of the Chinese pair.
The slogan came to prominence during protests in Hong Kong in 2019 and has been banned in the territory under the Chinese Communist Party’s National Security Law.
“Today is China’s National Day, and I will not allow this kind of flag to be displayed here,” Yao said, according to video clips released by the Hong Kong group and Radio Free Asia, a US government-funded news service.
The video clips also show Yao engaged in an altercation with people at the event.
“Taiwan and Hong Kong are part of China,” Yao said in the video before a police officer led the couple away from the scene.
The MAC warned Chinese against making “statements harmful to Taiwan’s autonomous status” or otherwise engaging in “acts undermining the nation’s sovereignty” while in Taiwan, citing the Regulations Governing the Approval of Entry of People of the Mainland Area into the Taiwan Area.
Article 12 of the regulations stipulate that Chinese visiting Taiwan risk having their entry permits revoked if they “engage in inappropriate acts that breach the principle of equality and dignity.”
NATIONAL SECURITY: The Chinese influencer shared multiple videos on social media in which she claimed Taiwan is a part of China and supported its annexation Freedom of speech does not allow comments by Chinese residents in Taiwan that compromise national security or social stability, the nation’s top officials said yesterday, after the National Immigration Agency (NIA) revoked the residency permit of a Chinese influencer who published videos advocating China annexing Taiwan by force. Taiwan welcomes all foreigners to settle here and make families so long as they “love the land and people of Taiwan,” Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) told lawmakers during a plenary session at the Legislative Yuan in Taipei. The public power of the government must be asserted when necessary and the Ministry of
Proposed amendments would forbid the use of all personal electronic devices during school hours in high schools and below, starting from the next school year in August, the Ministry of Education said on Monday. The Regulations on the Use of Mobile Devices at Educational Facilities up to High Schools (高級中等以下學校校園行動載具使用原則) state that mobile devices — defined as mobile phones, laptops, tablets, smartwatches or other wearables — should be turned off at school. The changes would stipulate that use of such devices during class is forbidden, and the devices should be handed to a teacher or the school for safekeeping. The amendments also say
EMBRACING TAIWAN: US lawmakers have introduced an act aiming to replace the use of ‘Chinese Taipei’ with ‘Taiwan’ across all Washington’s federal agencies A group of US House of Representatives lawmakers has introduced legislation to replace the term “Chinese Taipei” with “Taiwan” across all federal agencies. US Representative Byron Donalds announced the introduction of the “America supports Taiwan act,” which would mandate federal agencies adopt “Taiwan” in place of “Chinese Taipei,” a news release on his page on the US House of Representatives’ Web site said. US representatives Mike Collins, Barry Moore and Tom Tiffany are cosponsors of the legislation, US political newspaper The Hill reported yesterday. “The legislation is a push to normalize the position of Taiwan as an autonomous country, although the official US
CHANGE OF TONE: G7 foreign ministers dropped past reassurances that there is no change in the position of the G7 members on Taiwan, including ‘one China’ policies G7 foreign ministers on Friday took a tough stance on China, stepping up their language on Taiwan and omitting some conciliatory references from past statements, including to “one China” policies. A statement by ministers meeting in Canada mirrored last month’s Japan-US statement in condemning “coercion” toward Taiwan. Compared with a G7 foreign ministers’ statement in November last year, the statement added members’ concerns over China’s nuclear buildup, although it omitted references to their concerns about Beijing’s human rights abuses in Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong. Also missing were references stressing the desire for “constructive and stable relations with China” and
RSS