The first talks between Taiwan and Indonesian officials about lifting an embargo on the importation of Indonesian workers is scheduled for this afternoon at the Council of Labor Affairs (CLA), after the Indonesians called off a meeting yesterday at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
"We received a fax from the Indonesian representative office which states that the two negotiators and the vice chairman of the representative office are coming to visit us tomorrow afternoon," Kuo Fang-yu (
Indonesian Economic and Trade Office to Taipei Vice Chairman Supono yesterday confirmed that a meeting has been scheduled for today, but emphasized that completing a comprehensive proposal for the negotiations is his country's priority.
"We hope that we could hold negotiations as soon as possible. But if we can't complete the proposal tonight, tomorrow's talks might be postponed again," Supono said.
Igusti Mude Arka, director of the Placement and Promotion Council of Indonesia's Department of Manpower and Transmigration, and Hotma Jaipan, another council official, arrived in Taipei late Tuesday night.
According to the Indonesian Economic And Trade Office to Taipei, its officials and the two negotiators spent all of yesterday preparing a proposal, which forced the office to call off the meeting at the foreign ministry.
Peter Cheng (鄭博久), director-general of the ministry's Department of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, said the closed-door meeting, set for 2 to 2:30pm, was cancelled because the Indonesian side needed to complete their own consultations.
"They said they arrived in Taipei rather late and felt tired. They also said they needed to hold internal meetings with officials at Jakarta's representative office in Taipei before negotiating with us," said Cheng.
The ban on Indonesia workers took effect Aug. 1. The Council claims that the Indonesian government hadn't made any effort to reduce the increasing rates of absence among its workers in Taiwan. It also cited Jakarta's requirement that employment brokers retain a NT$3,000 per month bond from Indonesian workers' wages, payable to the employee at the end of their contract -- something other countries that supply workers to Taiwan do not require. The Council also said that most of the documents submitted by labor brokers to guarantee that their brokerage fees had been lowered were false.
Independent Legislator Chiu Chuang-laing (邱創良), who visited Indonesia to discuss migrant worker issues, said the Indonesian representative office should take responsibility for failing to pass information on to the Jakarta government.
"The representative office hasn't passed the CLA's arguments back to the Indonesian government in the past few months, which resulted the ban and a lot of misunderstandings," Chiu said.
Chiu added that the Indonesian government is willing to solve the problems with the CLA and he is confident that the problems would be solved.
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