Amendments to the Sexual Abuse Prevention Act (性侵害防治法), which passed the Legislative Yuan in January, took effect yesterday. Requirements include the use of an electronic tracking system for paroled sex offenders and notifying communities of the presence of registered sex offenders.
But the Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) system, which has been adopted by the Ministry of Justice as the standard tool for tracking offenders, has not been completed in time. Videophones will therefore be set up in paroled sex offenders' residences as a temporary monitoring mechanism, the ministry said.
The Criminal Investigation Bureau said that the reason for the amendment was to improve protection of victims of sexual abuse, and to establish a strong community network to monitor sex offenders.
Under the amendment, paroled sex offenders will be restricted from certain areas or be placed under a curfew, and will be asked to wear an electronic tracking device. Receivers installed in places where parolees are not permitted to enter will cause the device to beep if offenders approach within 15m of the location.
To better protect victims, the identities of people who report sexual abuse will remain confidential. Media organizations that release a victim's name or other personal data can be punished with fines of NT$60,000 to NT$600,000 (US$1,900 to US$19,000).
Offenders are required to report their whereabouts and background to police.
The information will only be available to selected police officers. In addition, offenders with mental illnesses will receive enforced treatment that will continue until the "rate of recidivism" declines.
It was not immediately clear how this would be determined.
The Violence Prevention Legislative Change Alliance, which is made up of 11 different civic groups devoted to women's and children's issues, pressed for the amendments, as well as two other laws: the Domestic Violence Prevention Act (
The alliance said that the amendment had made the law more practical and would benefit the public.
Gau Fehng-shian (
"We [the alliance] think that Megan's Law, which requires sex-offender registration and community notification, not only ensures the safety of victims and community members, but also prevents paroled criminals from becoming recidivists," she said.
Megan's Law, which was signed by former US president Bill Clinton into law in 1996, requires states to register individuals convicted of sex crimes, allows states discretion to establish criteria for disclosure, but also compels them to make private and personal information on registered sex offenders publicly available.
In response to criticism that the tracking devices and registration violated the human rights of offenders, Garden of Hope Foundation executive director Chi Hui-jung (
"The system should not be viewed as a device that violates human rights. Instead, I think it is a useful system to protect the offenders' human rights by preventing them from having to go to jail again," she added.
The ministry said that the RFID tracking device would resemble a wristwatch, so that offenders could maintain a low profile despite the fact that they were being monitored.
If the offenders remove the device and fail to report to the police, the ministry will notify local police stations or case workers to investigate.
Offenders will be jailed if they fail to cooperate, the ministry said.
GREAT POWER COMPETITION: Beijing views its military cooperation with Russia as a means to push back against the joint power of the US and its allies, an expert said A recent Sino-Russian joint air patrol conducted over the waters off Alaska was designed to counter the US military in the Pacific and demonstrated improved interoperability between Beijing’s and Moscow’s forces, a national security expert said. National Defense University associate professor Chen Yu-chen (陳育正) made the comment in an article published on Wednesday on the Web site of the Journal of the Chinese Communist Studies Institute. China and Russia sent four strategic bombers to patrol the waters of the northern Pacific and Bering Strait near Alaska in late June, one month after the two nations sent a combined flotilla of four warships
THE TOUR: Pope Francis has gone on a 12-day visit to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore. He was also invited to Taiwan The government yesterday welcomed Pope Francis to the Asia-Pacific region and said it would continue extending an invitation for him to visit Taiwan. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs made the remarks as Pope Francis began a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific on Monday. He is to travel about 33,000km by air to visit Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore, and would arrive back in Rome on Friday next week. It would be the longest and most challenging trip of Francis’ 11-year papacy. The 87-year-old has had health issues over the past few years and now uses a wheelchair. The ministry said
‘LEADERS’: The report highlighted C.C. Wei’s management at TSMC, Lisa Su’s decisionmaking at AMD and the ‘rock star’ status of Nvidia’s Huang Time magazine on Thursday announced its list of the 100 most influential people in artificial intelligence (AI), which included Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) chairman and chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家), Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) and AMD chair and CEO Lisa Su (蘇姿丰). The list is divided into four categories: Leaders, Innovators, Shapers and Thinkers. Wei and Huang were named in the Leaders category. Other notable figures in the Leaders category included Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Meta CEO and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. Su was listed in the Innovators category. Time highlighted Wei’s
EVERYONE’S ISSUE: Kim said that during a visit to Taiwan, she asked what would happen if China attacked, and was told that the global economy would shut down Taiwan is critical to the global economy, and its defense is a “here and now” issue, US Representative Young Kim said during a roundtable talk on Taiwan-US relations on Friday. Kim, who serves on the US House of Representatives’ Foreign Affairs Committee, held a roundtable talk titled “Global Ties, Local Impact: Why Taiwan Matters for California,” at Santiago Canyon College in Orange County, California. “Despite its small size and long distance from us, Taiwan’s cultural and economic importance is felt across our communities,” Kim said during her opening remarks. Stanford University researcher and lecturer Lanhee Chen (陳仁宜), lawyer Lin Ching-chi
RSS