A coalition of non-governmental organizations on Friday started a petition calling on the government not to detain or deport undocumented migrant workers who seek medical treatment during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The online petition urges the government to suspend arrests of undocumented migrant workers, because they would otherwise be reluctant to seek medical treatment for fear of deportation, Hsinchu Catholic Diocese Migrants and Immigrants Service Center director Gracie Liu (劉曉櫻) said.
“The idea is to let them seek medical treatment or consultation, and be able to freely leave hospitals and clinics without fear of arrest,” Liu said.
Photo provided by the Taichung City Government Labor Affairs Bureau
Concerns of a crackdown were raised on Feb. 28, when the Ministry of Labor’s Workforce Development Agency Deputy Director-General Tsai Meng-liang (蔡孟良) said that a system, formed in collaboration with the National Immigration Agency (NIA), would soon begin tracking undocumented migrant workers.
Tsai made the statement after an undocumented female caregiver from Indonesia was confirmed on Feb. 26 as the 32nd person in the nation to contract COVID-19.
The petition also calls on the government to abolish penalties and re-entry bans for undocumented migrant workers who wish to return to their country of origin during the pandemic, Liu said.
Under the law, if an undocumented worker is arrested and deported, they permanently lose their right to work in Taiwan.
In response, Paul Su (蘇裕國), deputy director of the Cross-Border Workforce Management Division of the ministry’s Workforce Development Agency, said the ministry for the time being would not pursue any large-scale crackdown on undocumented workers.
“However, to abolition fines, re-entry bans and restore documented status to workers requires a revision of the current laws, which requires a consensus in society,” he said.
If a member of the general public reports an undocumented migrant worker, the ministry would still investigate, although deportation would be up to the NIA, he said.
There were an estimated 48,545 undocumented migrant workers in Taiwan as of the end of January, with 290 in detention centers, NIA statistics showed.
The petition was started by migrant worker organizations, academics and experts, including the Taiwan International Workers’ Association, the Domestic Caretakers Union Taoyuan, Serve the People Association in Taoyuan, Hope Workers’ Center and the Migrants and Immigrants Service Center.
TOO CLOSE FOR COMFORT: A US Air Force KC-135 tanker came less than 1,000 feet of an EVA plane and was warned off by a Taipei air traffic controller, a report said A US aerial refueling aircraft came very close to an EVA Airways jet in the airspace over southern Taiwan, a military aviation news Web site said. A report published by Alert 5 on Tuesday said that automatic dependent surveillance–broadcast (ADS-B) data captured by planfinder.net on Wednesday last week showed a US Air Force KC-135 tanker “coming less than 1,000 feet [305m] vertically with EVA Air flight BR225 as both aircraft crossed path south of Taiwan” that morning. The report included an audio recording of a female controller from the Taipei air traffic control center telling the unidentified aircraft that it was
A series of discussions on the legacy of martial law and authoritarianism are to be held at the Taipei International Book Exhibition this month, featuring findings and analysis by the Transitional Justice Commission. The commission and publisher Book Republic organized the series, entitled “Escaping the Nation’s Labyrinth of Memory: What Authoritarian Symbols and Records Can Tell Us,” to help people navigate narratives through textual analysis and comparisons with other nations. The four-day series is to begin on Thursday next week with a discussion between commission Chairwoman Yang Tsui (楊翠), Polish-language translator Lin Wei-yun (林蔚昀), and Polish author and artist Pawel Gorecki comparing
MOVING OUT: A former professor said that rent and early education costs in Taipei are the nation’s highest, which makes it difficult for young people to start families The population of Taipei last year fell to the lowest in 23 years due to high rent, more transportation options and the expansion of northern cities into a single metropolis, academics and city officials said on Monday. Data released this month by the Ministry of the Interior showed that the capital was home to 2,602,418 people last year, down 42,623 from 2019. The decline is second only to 1993, when the population fell by 42,828 people, while Taipei’s population was the lowest it has been since 1997. Taipei saw the biggest drop among the six special municipalities, while Taoyuan led the group in
A US aircraft carrier group led by the USS Theodore Roosevelt has entered the South China Sea to promote “freedom of the seas,” the US military said yesterday, as tensions between China and Taiwan raise concerns in Washington. US Indo-Pacific Command said in a statement that the strike group entered the South China Sea on Saturday, the same day Taiwan reported a large incursion of Chinese bombers and fighter jets into its air defense identification zone near the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島). The US military said the carrier strike group was in the South China Sea, a large part of which
RSS