For Tsai Jo-shih (
"I had never imagined the word `Taiwan' on the passport would be so useful," Tsai said upon retrieving his confiscated passport and visa fee after the Taiwanese embassy intervened on his behalf on Wednesday.
The misunderstanding arose when Tsai handed customs officials his Taiwanese passport, issued in 2001, to enter St. Lucia during the Taiwan Bird Observation Team's visit to the country.
PHOTO: CHENG HSU-KAI, TAIPEI TIMES
The team, of which Tsai is a member, was commissioned to help St. Lucia investigate, observe and establish a database for its bird population.
The new version of the Taiwanese passport, with the name "Taiwan" on the cover, started being issued on Sept. 1, 2003.
Mistaking Tsai's old passport for a Chinese one, St. Lucia immigration officers confiscated his passport and asked him to pay the US$50 visa fee.
Taiwanese Ambassador to St. Lucia Tom Chou (
Many people cannot tell Taiwan from China, he said.
"Adding `Taiwan' on the cover of the passport is the right policy and it would have solved the problem in this case," Chou said.
Team leader Tien Chiu-chin (田秋堇), who is also a Democratic Progressive Party legislator, said that Chinese passport holders are often questioned at customs and have to go through stricter security checks because of the great number of Chinese human smugglers.
St. Lucia first established diplomatic ties with Taiwan in 1984, before switching diplomatic recognition to China.
It restored diplomatic relations with Taiwan on April 26. On April 30, St. Lucia Minister of Foreign Affairs Rufus Bousquet and his Taiwanese counterpart, James Huang (黃志芳), signed a joint communique on restoring ties between the two countries in Castries.
DEFENSE: The National Security Bureau promised to expand communication and intelligence cooperation with global partners and enhance its strategic analytical skills China has not only increased military exercises and “gray zone” tactics against Taiwan this year, but also continues to recruit military personnel for espionage, the National Security Bureau (NSB) said yesterday in a report to the Legislative Yuan. The bureau submitted the report ahead of NSB Director-General Tsai Ming-yen’s (蔡明彥) appearance before the Foreign and National Defense Committee today. Last year, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) conducted “Joint Sword-2024A and B” military exercises targeting Taiwan and carried out 40 combat readiness patrols, the bureau said. In addition, Chinese military aircraft entered Taiwan’s airspace 3,070 times last year, up about
A magnitude 4.3 earthquake struck eastern Taiwan's Hualien County at 8:31am today, according to the Central Weather Administration (CWA). The epicenter of the temblor was located in Hualien County, about 70.3 kilometers south southwest of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 23.2km, according to the administration. There were no immediate reports of damage resulting from the quake. The earthquake's intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a temblor, was highest in Taitung County, where it measured 3 on Taiwan's 7-tier intensity scale. The quake also measured an intensity of 2 in Hualien and Nantou counties, the CWA said.
The Overseas Community Affairs Council (OCAC) yesterday announced a fundraising campaign to support survivors of the magnitude 7.7 earthquake that struck Myanmar on March 28, with two prayer events scheduled in Taipei and Taichung later this week. “While initial rescue operations have concluded [in Myanmar], many survivors are now facing increasingly difficult living conditions,” OCAC Minister Hsu Chia-ching (徐佳青) told a news conference in Taipei. The fundraising campaign, which runs through May 31, is focused on supporting the reconstruction of damaged overseas compatriot schools, assisting students from Myanmar in Taiwan, and providing essential items, such as drinking water, food and medical supplies,
New Party Deputy Secretary-General You Chih-pin (游智彬) this morning went to the National Immigration Agency (NIA) to “turn himself in” after being notified that he had failed to provide proof of having renounced his Chinese household registration. He was one of more than 10,000 naturalized Taiwanese citizens from China who were informed by the NIA that their Taiwanese citizenship might be revoked if they fail to provide the proof in three months, people familiar with the matter said. You said he has proof that he had renounced his Chinese household registration and demanded the NIA provide proof that he still had Chinese
RSS