The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday urged people not to abuse Taiwan’s visa-free status by breaking the law abroad, following reports of Taiwanese flying to countries to engage in telecom fraud.
“We strongly urge people not to abuse the nation’s visa-free status to engage in illegal behavior overseas, to prevent wasting national resources, while putting themselves at risk of extradition” to China, Department of East Asian and Pacific Affairs Director-General Michael Lin (林昭宏) said.
Despite the ministry earlier this month urging Taiwanese not to “push their luck” abroad, it has received several reports of Taiwanese visiting Thailand to travel to scam centers in Cambodia, Myanmar or other areas in the region, Lin said.
Photo: CNA
Some Taiwanese traveled to South Korea to engage in telecom fraud, online gambling rings, money muling or other illegal activities, he said.
“Such behavior has attracted heightened concern from law enforcement agencies in Thailand and South Korea,” Lin said. “They also negatively impact the mutual trust and cooperation between Taiwan’s overseas missions and local police and immigration agencies in these countries.”
Taiwan’s overseas missions have repeatedly coordinated with local authorities to prevent people from engaging in illegal activities, but some have insisted on traveling to scam centers even after they have been informed of the risks, while a few deliberately avoided governmental assistance, he said.
Some of the people and their families knew they were traveling abroad with the aim of engaging in illegal or “gray area” activities, but later requested that the government expend enormous diplomatic and police resources to help them when they got in trouble, he said.
“MOFA stresses that the government’s emergency rescue services are limited public resources to be used based on humanitarian concerns,” Lin said, adding that they are not for cleaning up the messes of people engaging in illegal activity abroad.
If people insist on traveling to scam centers while knowing the risks, the government cannot fully bear the consequences and liability for them, he added.
Sixty-two countries have extradition agreements with China and 67 countries have mutual legal assistance treaties with China, he said.
In some cases, Taiwanese who completed their criminal sentences abroad were informed by local authorities that China’s representative office had been contacted about extraditing them to China, Lin said.
“MOFA wants to remind people that if they are involved in criminal activity overseas, they will not only face local judicial proceedings, but also the risk of being extradited to China, which might lead to severe consequences,” he said.
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