Quarantined and disadvantaged people are the government’s priorities in evacuating people from China, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday, following reports that Taiwanese stranded in China’s Hubei Province plan to sue the government for “violating the Constitution.”
Hundreds of Taiwanese are stuck in Wuhan, the provincial capital, but evacuation efforts have stalled as Taiwanese and Chinese authorities disagree on the details of evacuation flights, while some of the stranded people have expressed the hope to return home as individual travelers.
A Taiwanese businessperson in Hubei told reporters that many of the Taiwanese are anxious to return to work in Taiwan.
They have waited for more than a month, they said, adding that there have been no messages from the government.
Therefore, they have asked a lawyer in Taiwan to help “sue [President] Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) administration for violating the Constitution, limiting personal freedoms and depriving us of our right to go home,” they said.
Everyone is disappointed, which is why they made this “heavy” decision to find a way to return home, they said.
The council said that in response to the COVID-19 outbreak, the government on Jan. 30 established the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC), which it said uses various measures based on the changing situation.
The CECC has said that Taiwan is ready to send a second charter flight and that it can bring back the stranded Taiwanese any time, the council said.
The government is coordinating and communicating with China about the list of people who would return to Taiwan first, as well as preventive measures, it said.
This is based on overall considerations for epidemic prevention, safeguarding the health of Taiwanese and guaranteeing the safe return of stranded Taiwanese, it added.
Other governments have similar considerations when evacuating their citizens from China, a government official said on condition of anonymity.
Preventing an epidemic and protecting people are the government’s top priorities, they said.
Compared with other countries, Taiwan’s first evacuation flight did not meet these needs, the source said.
Taiwan worked with Japanese authorities to evacuate its citizens from the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which did not involve prioritizing vulnerable people, and the Hong Kong government is expected to evacuate Hong Kongers stranded in Wuhan using a similar method, an anonymous source familiar with foreign matters said.
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