More than 2,000 Chinese spouses living in Taiwan are yet to submit proof of having renounced their Chinese household registration, National Immigration Agency (NIA) director Lin Hung-en (林宏恩) said.
The Legislative Yuan’s Judiciary and Organic Laws Committee and Internal Administration Committee today jointly reviewed proposals from lawmakers regarding a “new immigrant development agency” within the Ministry of the Interior, with Lin and several other officials invited to attend.
The deadline for Chinese spouses living in Taiwan to submit proof of having renounced their Chinese household registration, providing an affidavit or meeting conditions for an exemption or deferral is today, after the NIA had sent notices to the spouses in early April asking them to submit this proof within three months.
Photo: CNA
The NIA would use all possible means to get in contact with the remaining spouses, Lin said, including cross-checking health insurance records or asking for assistance from security services.
At a news conference on Thursday, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) deputy head and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said that of the 2,237 individuals who have yet to contact the government, authorities know the location of about 20 percent of them.
The NIA would conduct in-person visits soon in order to deliver the necessary forms in person, it said.
For spouses who demonstrate willingness to take action to resolve the issue, Lin said that the agency would not “directly resort” to major decisions like revoking their household registration in Taiwan.
Those who have yet to contact the government could have done so for a variety of reasons, such as not having children in Taiwan, being relatively old or unaware of the new regulations, Lin said.
The agency intends to try all means of contacting them to resolve these issues, he added.
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The first of 10 new high-capacity trains purchased from South Korea’s Hyundai Rotem arrived at the Port of Taipei yesterday to meet the demands of an expanding metro network, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. The train completed a three-day, 1,200km voyage from the Port of Masan in South Korea, the company said. Costing NT$590 million (US$18.79 million) each, the new six-carriage trains feature a redesigned interior based on "human-centric" transportation concepts, TRTC said. The design utilizes continuous longitudinal seating to widen the aisles and optimize passenger flow, while also upgrading passenger information displays and driving control systems for a more comfortable
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