Civic groups yesterday submitted a petition to the Control Yuan stating that regulations requiring transgender people to undergo gender-affirming surgery before changing their official gender designation are unconstitutional.
It has been ruled many times that forcing or mandating any type of surgery is unconstitutional, yet the Ministry of the Interior in 2008 issued an executive order requiring transgender people to undergo surgery to remove gender-specific organs before altering official documents, the groups said.
The groups called on the Control Yuan to launch an investigation into the ministry for neglecting its duties and its failure to enact the necessary amendments.
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
Control Yuan member Chi Hui-jung (紀惠容) met the groups outside the Control Yuan following a news conference to receive the petition.
The conference was held by the Taiwan Alliance to Promote Civil Partnership Rights (TAPCPR) and nine other groups, including the Taiwan Association for Human Rights, Amnesty International Taiwan, and the Intersex, Transgender and Transsexual People Care Association.
The ministry on Nov. 3, 2008, issued Document No. 0970066240, informing household registration offices that transgender people wishing to change their gender designation on identification cards must present two diagnostic affidavits from psychiatrists and a certification issued by an accredited medical institution that they have undergone surgery to remove gender-specific organs.
For transgender men, the required surgeries are removal of breasts, uterus and ovaries, and for transgender women, the penis and testicles.
For many years, the groups have been arguing that these requirements contravene the principle of legal reservation under the Constitution, which regulates the relationship between the state and its citizens.
The groups have repeatedly called upon the ministry to enact amendments, saying that the regulations infringe on the rights, bodily autonomy and human dignity of transgender people.
However, after a decade, their requests continue to be ignored, the groups said.
Since Xiao E (小E) became the first transgender woman in Taiwan to change her legal gender without providing proof of gender-affirming surgery in 2021, the Supreme Court and six High Court rulings have found the directive unconstitutional, they said.
Furthermore, the UN has clearly stated that forcing surgery is a breach of international human rights that is cruel and inhumane, and is a form of gender and sexual identity discrimination, Covenants Watch chief executive Chiang Meng-chen (江孟真) said.
The Ministry of Health and Welfare in 2013 convened a meeting that concluded that legal gender recognition should be separated from medical intervention, but no policy has since been enacted to reflect this, she said.
The WHO released a new International Classification of Diseases in 2018 that reclassified gender identity from a mental disorder to a sexual health condition that would be recognized and protected, TAPCPR secretary-general Chien Chih-chieh (簡至潔) said.
The UN in 2017 also issued recommendations against gender discrimination, stating that gender identity should be based on self-identification and no transgender person should be forced to undergo medical intervention, she said.
The current directive forces transgender people to either undergo surgery as dictated by the directive or endure lengthy appeals and lawsuits to change their legal gender, she said, adding that these outdated policies must be reformed by the Ministry of the Interior.
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