Tibet supporters and human rights groups yesterday urged the government to amend the Immigration Act (出入國及移民法) and pass an asylum bill to grant legal status to Tibetans and other international refugees.
“The government said that it will issue temporary residency to the Tibetans [in the group on Liberty Square in Taipei], but it’s not the final solution to their problems as temporary residency does not allow them to work,” Taiwan Friends of Tibet vice-chairman Yang Chang-chen (楊長鎮) told a press conference at Liberty Square.
More than 100 Tibetans living in Taiwan without legal status have been staging a sit-in demonstration on the square since Sept. 9, pleading with the government to grant them asylum.
PHOTO: CHIANG YING-YING, AP
Many of them had made the dangerous crossing through the Himalayas into Nepal before coming to Taiwan on forged Nepalese or Indian passports.
After a meeting with Tibetan and human rights activists on Monday, the government said it would likely issue temporary residency permits to the Tibetans and help them find shelter so that they could at least live in the country legally.
The activists, however, don’t think the government has gone far enough.
“The Tibetan pandas enjoyed a high-profile warm welcome, while the Tibetan refugees were left aside — this is not good for Taiwan’s international image,” Yang said.
China’s Wolong National Nature Reserve, the major habitat for pandas, is in a part of Sichuan Province that was traditionally a Tibetan domain and was part of an independent Tibet before the Chinese invasion in 1959.
After the activists performed a short play to reenact segments of Tibetan history, some of the Tibetan protesters presented khatas — a traditional Tibetan scarf used to show welcome or respect to someone — to an activist wearing a panda costume to show that that they hoped to live happily together in Taiwan as they once did in Wolong.
“Our first choice is to have a refugee bill so that all international refugees could benefit from it,” Yang said.
“If not, we would settle for a revised Immigration Act that adds a special clause for the Tibetans here,” Yang said.
While the Democratic Progressive Party legislative caucus and some individual Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers have shown interest in helping the Tibetans, Yang said he hoped the issue could be resolved as soon as possible.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is maintaining close ties with Beijing, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said yesterday, hours after a new round of Chinese military drills in the Taiwan Strait began. Political parties in a democracy have a responsibility to be loyal to the nation and defend its sovereignty, DPP spokesman Justin Wu (吳崢) told a news conference in Taipei. His comments came hours after Beijing announced via Chinese state media that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Theater Command was holding large-scale drills simulating a multi-pronged attack on Taiwan. Contrary to the KMT’s claims that it is staunchly anti-communist, KMT Deputy
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty