A draft refugee act yesterday passed initial review at the Legislative Yuan’s Internal Administration Committee, with the final version establishing an asylum application process for the first time in the nation’s history.
It seeks to grant protection to victims of persecution, while stopping short of providing asylum guarantees to people persecuted because of their gender or sexual orientation.
“Today is the happiest meeting the Internal Administration Committee has had this session,” committee co-convener and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Huang Chao-shun (黃昭順) said after an unusually smooth discussion session.
While this session’s committee meetings have been marked by extended quarrels over legislative rules and transitional justice legislation, yesterday’s committee finished the review in less than two hours, passing a draft bill that largely resembled the Executive Yuan’s official version.
Deputy Minister of the Interior Hua Ching-chun (花敬群) said the draft bill was originally presented under the administration of former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) in 2006, with the ministry handling refugees on a case-by-case basis.
The draft bill seeks to allow foreigners or stateless persons to apply for asylum if they can demonstrate that they have been forced out of their homelands because of war or natural disaster, while also granting asylum to those who demonstrate that they have ample reason to fear persecution because of their race, religion, nationality, social group or political views.
Amendments to the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (兩岸人民關係條例), which passed initial committee review last month, could also be applicable alongside the proposed refugee bill to help groups such as Tibetans and Chinese dissidents if the draft bills are passed by the Legislative Yuan’s general assembly.
Yesterday’s committee discussion focused on several amendments proposed by legislators to further guarantee refugee rights, such as giving refugee claimants the right to appeal application rejections, granting applicants the right to receive a written decision in a language they can understand and forbidding the Ministry of Interior from drafting implementation rules that violate provisions of the UN Convention relating to the Status of Refugees.
Legislators also stripped the draft bill of language that would have denied asylum to people who would threaten the nation’s “good morals,” while requiring the ministry to “take into consideration” gender and sexual orientation in determining refugee status.
An appended motion proposed by DPP Legislator Yu Mei-nu (尤美女) would have included gender and sexual orientation within the bill’s definition of protection against persecution for those who belong to a “special social group,” but was revised following opposition from Hua.
“We will pay attention to [gender and sexual orientation] while determining refugee status, but it would not be appropriate to write these into the law because portions of these issues will involve individual cognition,” Hua said. “Sexual discrimination is purely an individual feeling that would probably involve medical judgement, so these would be individual cases — what if a country does not allow someone to marry their partner and then they come to Taiwan seeking asylum?”
The draft bill is to be referred to the Legislative Yuan’s general assembly, along with a proposed ethnic fairness act passed by the committee on Wednesday.
Taiwan does not exclude the possibility of having formal diplomatic relations with countries that also have formal ties with China, regardless of Beijing’s stance, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said on Sunday. There was speculation in 2012 that Honduras was attempting to have simultaneous diplomatic relations with Taiwan and China, an idea that then-minister of foreign affairs David Lin (林永樂) rejected. Honduras severed formal ties with Taiwan on Sunday morning after establishing diplomatic relations with Beijing. President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) administration has taken a more practical approach to relations with like-minded countries since assuming government in 2016. Previous administrations took the
Seven senior faculty members, including the principal, of a high school in Taichung were temporarily suspended from their jobs on Friday, pending an investigation by the Taichung Education Bureau into alleged bullying and abuse that led to the suicide of a student last month. The city’s education officials were too slow to suspend those involved, the student’s father told a news conference on Wednesday, at which Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chang Liao Wan-chien (張廖萬堅) and members of the Humanistic Education Foundation were also present. The boy had been a good student and a high achiever during elementary and junior-high, and had
ORIGIN UNKNOWN: The Leofoo Village Theme Park and Taipei Zoo have accounted for their baboons, as authorities continue a 12-day capture attempt Authorities in Taoyuan are searching for a non-native baboon, possibly of the chacma species, that has been spotted several times in the city’s Pingjhen District (平鎮) over the past 12 days, and was most recently seen in coastal Sinwu District (新屋). The baboon was first spotted near a local factory on March 10 in central Taoyuan, Jhensing Borough Warden Huang Chih-chieh (黃志杰) said. Huang said he requested the Leofoo Village Theme Park’s help after a second sighting on Saturday. In other sightings, the baboon raided fruit and vegetable gardens on private property, and has evaded one capture attempt via a tranquilizer dart. Media reported
Taiwan would have established formal relations with Argentina long ago if not for China’s interference, Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Alexander Yui told US-based Spanish-language online news outlet Infobae in an interview published on Tuesday. Beijing has left behind a string of unfulfilled promises in Latin America, including pledges to build the Grand Nicaragua Canal and airports, docks, ports and industrial zones in El Salvador, he said. Meanwhile, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Mexico and other countries enjoy pragmatic and improving relations with Taiwan based on cooperation on the economy, culture, technology and science, he said. While Taiwan is “happy to live and let live,”
RSS