The International Workshop on Combating Human Trafficking organized by the Taiwan Ministry of the Interior was unveiled today (Sept. 1). It included Lo Ping-cheng, Executive Yuan Minister without Portfolio, Chen Tsung-Yen, Deputy Minister of Interior, and Dr. Brent Christensen, Director of the American Institute in Taiwan, many industry participants, including Tigerair Taiwan, in attendance who jointly took an oath to combat forced labor.
Deputy Minister Chen Tsung-Yen said that Taiwan has been rated as a Tier 1 country in the TIP report issued by the U.S. State Department for 11 consecutive years, and has been listed as a country with the second lowest crime rate and second highest safety index in the world by the “Crime Index by Country”. This is a result of the close cooperation between government and the private sector. It is hoped that through exchanges and sharing of Taiwan’s experience, it will be possible to cooperate with the international community in combatting human trafficking.
According to the Ministry of the Interior, Taiwan’s human trafficking primarily involves either labor or sexual exploitation. The number of foreign victims in protective placement in 2019 dropped to 92, which is the lowest since implementation of the Human Trafficking Prevention Act in 2009. As affected by the global pandemic this year, in 2020 international human trafficking has also been relatively reduced. However, the various Taiwan government departments have continued prevention and control work, while endeavoring to address emerging issues that may arise from the end of the pandemic, and to plan the “2021-2022 Exploitation Prevention Plan”, to ensure even better prevention work every year.
The Ministry of the Interior pointed out that the number of migrant workers in Taiwan is as many as 700,000 persons. Some potentially vulnerable people are not familiar with the Taiwanese languages may not feel they are able to effectively lodge complaints when they are victimized. Therefore, the government is actively promoting nationwide understanding of the sign language for “help”, and for the first time during the opening ceremony of the International Workshop on Combating Human Trafficking, simultaneous interpretation in sign language was arranged, with sign language rescue information in “Mandarin Chinese”, “Indonesian”, “Vietnamese” and “Thai” published in the conference manual, in the hope to better empower victims to communicate and avail themselves of more opportunities to find help.
According to the National Immigration Agency, Ministry of the Interior, this year’s workshop explored the four themes of pursuing “Overall strategies for preventing human trafficking”, “Victim safety and rebirth”, “The new protagonist in anti-labor exploitation efforts - Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)” and “Important national challenges and breakthroughs in preventing human trafficking”. As affected by the pandemic, with the result that foreign officials and international organizations could not directly deploy their personnel to Taiwan, but representatives of foreign missions and representative offices in Taiwan attended, along with personnel from non-governmental organizations, and persons concerned with human trafficking issues who all actively participated. There were also some foreign speakers who used pre-recorded or videoconferencing methods to participate.
Pre-recorded videos from 3 foreign speakers were shown at this year’s workshop including Hong Kong Lawyer Patsy Ho, the winner of the US Department of State’s “Human Trafficking Hero Award 2020”, who has conducted in-depth research on human trafficking in Hong Kong; British speaker Luke de Pulford, who serves as the CEO of the Arise Foundation, and who introduced the new concept of “Ethical Recruitment” to the guests at the conference; and Mark Charoenwong, Prosecutor with the Supreme Public Prosecutor’s Office of the Ministry of Justice of Thailand, who described the current situation of human trafficking in the ASEAN region with a presentation entitled the “Association of Southeast Asian Nations and Thailand’s Challenges in Combating Human Trafficking”.
Today’s activities include representatives of private industry and important civic sector stakeholders such as the Eden Social Welfare Foundation, the SouthEast Asia Group, FCF Co., Ltd. and Tigerair Taiwan. They all attended the joint oath ceremony to combat forced labor, demonstrating the determination of Taiwan’s government and enterprises in the global fight against slavery and our commitment to jointly combatting human trafficking.
Taiwan has received more than US$70 million in royalties as of the end of last year from developing the F-16V jet as countries worldwide purchase or upgrade to this popular model, government and military officials said on Saturday. Taiwan funded the development of the F-16V jet and ended up the sole investor as other countries withdrew from the program. Now the F-16V is increasingly popular and countries must pay Taiwan a percentage in royalties when they purchase new F-16V aircraft or upgrade older F-16 models. The next five years are expected to be the peak for these royalties, with Taiwan potentially earning
STAY IN YOUR LANE: As the US and Israel attack Iran, the ministry has warned China not to overstep by including Taiwanese citizens in its evacuation orders The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday rebuked a statement by China’s embassy in Israel that it would evacuate Taiwanese holders of Chinese travel documents from Israel amid the latter’s escalating conflict with Iran. Tensions have risen across the Middle East in the wake of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran beginning Saturday. China subsequently issued an evacuation notice for its citizens. In a news release, the Chinese embassy in Israel said holders of “Taiwan compatriot permits (台胞證)” issued to Taiwanese nationals by Chinese authorities for travel to China — could register for evacuation to Egypt. In Taipei, the ministry yesterday said Taiwan
‘LIKE-MINDED PARTNER’: Tako van Popta said it would be inappropriate to delay signing the deal with Taiwan because of China, adding he would promote the issue Canadian senators have stressed Taiwan’s importance for international trade and expressed enthusiasm for ensuring the Taiwan-Canada trade cooperation framework agreement is implemented this year. Representative to Canada Harry Tseng (曾厚仁) in an interview with the Central News Agency (CNA) said he was increasingly uneasy about Ottawa’s delays in signing the agreement, especially as Ottawa has warmed toward Beijing. There are “no negotiations left. Not only [is it] initialed, we have three versions of the text ready: English, French and Mandarin,” Tseng said. “That tells you how close we are to the final signature.” Tseng said that he hoped Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney
POSITIVE DEVELOPMENT: Japan and the US are expected to hold in-depth discussions on Taiwan-related issues during the meeting next month, Japanese sources said The holding of a Japan-US leaders’ meeting ahead of US President Donald Trump’s visit to China is positive news for Taiwan, former Japan-Taiwan Exchange Association representative Hiroyasu Izumi said yesterday. After the Liberal Democratic Party’s landslide victory in Japan’s House of Representatives election, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi is scheduled to visit the US next month, where she is to meet with Trump ahead of the US president’s planned visit to China from March 31 to April 2 for a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平). Japan and the US are expected to hold in-depth discussions on Taiwan-related issues during the
RSS