About 10 critically ill refugees and asylum seekers being held on Nauru have received medical treatment in Taiwan since a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed in September last year between Taiwan and Australia took effect in January, Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Andrew Lee (李憲章) said in Taipei yesterday.
The Guardian on May 14 reported that an Iranian refugee who had been flown to Taiwan for critical heart surgery and her 17-year-old son were on May 10 taken back to Nauru by Australian Border Force officers “against psychiatric advice.”
Deputy Representative to the UK Cheng Shyang-yun (程祥雲) on May 18 wrote a letter to the newspaper saying that the refugees were not “forcibly returned” and that the patients had “completed their treatment prior to leaving Taiwan.”
Photo: Liao Chen-huei, Taipei Times
“In consideration of Taiwan’s high-quality medical facilities and long-standing medical cooperation with Nauru,” an MOU was signed allowing refugees and asylum seekers who require urgent medical treatment to be transferred to Taiwan, Cheng said.
The ministry last month also denied the allegations.
It confirmed that an MOU had been signed, adding that Taiwan Adventist Hospital has been overseeing the medical transfers since January.
On Friday, in an online article titled “Send them to Taiwan: Turnbull government’s secret refugee deal revealed,” the Sydney Morning Herald reported that the Australian government signed “an undisclosed arrangement aimed at stopping [refugees on Nauru] from applying to stay in Australia after being treated in local hospitals.”
“The [Australian] government has never announced the memorandum of understanding and refused to release it on Friday,” it said.
“Australia is understood to have sought assistance from more countries for medical transfers. But Taiwan is the only one that has signed a deal with the Turnbull government,” the paper added.
The Guardian on Saturday in an online article reported that asylum seekers who had been flown from Nauru to Taiwan have complained of language barriers.
It reported that the MOU was signed “in an effort to prevent people indefinitely detained on the island from applying for a medical transfer to Australia.”
Lee yesterday reiterated the terms of the MOU and Taiwan’s dedication to global health.
The WHO constitution clearly states that health is a basic human right, Lee said.
To respond to the WHO’s concept of universal health coverage, Taiwan, in addition to defending its citizens’ right to health, is devoted to boosting its contributions to global healthcare, he said.
Nauru is a diplomatic ally of Taiwan, Lee said, adding that medical cooperation with that country has been going on for years and has received praise.
The MOU clearly states that Taiwan and Australia should abide by international human rights standards, and ensure that those involved are treated with dignity and receive appropriate medical treatment, he added.
Super Typhoon Kong-rey is the largest cyclone to impact Taiwan in 27 years, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. Kong-rey’s radius of maximum wind (RMW) — the distance between the center of a cyclone and its band of strongest winds — has expanded to 320km, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. The last time a typhoon of comparable strength with an RMW larger than 300km made landfall in Taiwan was Typhoon Herb in 1996, he said. Herb made landfall between Keelung and Suao (蘇澳) in Yilan County with an RMW of 350km, Chang said. The weather station in Alishan (阿里山) recorded 1.09m of
NO WORK, CLASS: President William Lai urged people in the eastern, southern and northern parts of the country to be on alert, with Typhoon Kong-rey approaching Typhoon Kong-rey is expected to make landfall on Taiwan’s east coast today, with work and classes canceled nationwide. Packing gusts of nearly 300kph, the storm yesterday intensified into a typhoon and was expected to gain even more strength before hitting Taitung County, the US Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center said. The storm is forecast to cross Taiwan’s south, enter the Taiwan Strait and head toward China, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The CWA labeled the storm a “strong typhoon,” the most powerful on its scale. Up to 1.2m of rainfall was expected in mountainous areas of eastern Taiwan and destructive winds are likely
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday at 5:30pm issued a sea warning for Typhoon Kong-rey as the storm drew closer to the east coast. As of 8pm yesterday, the storm was 670km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) and traveling northwest at 12kph to 16kph. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 162kph and gusts of up to 198kph, the CWA said. A land warning might be issued this morning for the storm, which is expected to have the strongest impact on Taiwan from tonight to early Friday morning, the agency said. Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) and Green Island (綠島) canceled classes and work
KONG-REY: A woman was killed in a vehicle hit by a tree, while 205 people were injured as the storm moved across the nation and entered the Taiwan Strait Typhoon Kong-rey slammed into Taiwan yesterday as one of the biggest storms to hit the nation in decades, whipping up 10m waves, triggering floods and claiming at least one life. Kong-rey made landfall in Taitung County’s Chenggong Township (成功) at 1:40pm, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The typhoon — the first in Taiwan’s history to make landfall after mid-October — was moving north-northwest at 21kph when it hit land, CWA data showed. The fast-moving storm was packing maximum sustained winds of 184kph, with gusts of up to 227kph, CWA data showed. It was the same strength as Typhoon Gaemi, which was the most
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