There should be no technical obstacles to adding a third gender option to passports as long as the Ministry of the Interior approves such an option for household registration and national identification purposes, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday.
The issuance of passports is conditional on the issuance of national identification cards, so if the interior ministry decides to include a third gender option, the foreign ministry would make the same change to passports, foreign ministry spokesman Andrew Lee (李憲章) said at a news conference.
Several countries have introduced an “X” — “unspecified” — gender option on passports, including Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Malta, Nepal and Denmark, according to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
Photo: Peter Lo, Taipei Times
If the government were to make new policy on the matter, the Department of Household Registration would make changes as required, department Director Chang Wan-yi (張琬宜) said.
The Executive Yuan’s Gender Equality Committee yesterday said it is working to introduce a third gender option on identity documents to protect the rights of transgender, intersex and other gender-diverse individuals.
The government has decided to add a third gender option, the committee said, adding that it is checking related laws, regulations and forms and would convene a cross-agency meeting to discuss specifics as soon as possible.
The policy involves several agencies and the committee predicts that multiple discussions would need to be held, it said.
In September last year, Minister Without Portfolio Lin Wan-I (林萬億) convened a meeting and instructed agencies to check laws, regulations and forms, the committee said.
Minister without Portfolio Lo Ping-cheng (羅秉成) is now responsible for supervising the preparatory work, it said.
After the examination, Lo is to convene a cross-agency meeting to discuss specifics and the short, medium and long-term goals of the policy, it added.
Further discussions are needed to decide on a timetable for the policy, the committee said.
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday said it is fully aware of the situation following reports that the son of ousted Chinese politician Bo Xilai (薄熙來) has arrived in Taiwan and is to marry a Taiwanese. Local media reported that Bo Guagua (薄瓜瓜), son of the former member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, is to marry the granddaughter of Luodong Poh-Ai Hospital founder Hsu Wen-cheng (許文政). The pair met when studying abroad and arranged to get married this year, with the wedding breakfast to be held at The One holiday resort in Hsinchu
The Taipei Zoo on Saturday said it would pursue legal action against a man who was filmed climbing over a railing to tease and feed spotted hyenas in their enclosure earlier that day. In videos uploaded to social media on Saturday, a man can be seen climbing over a protective railing and approaching a ledge above the zoo’s spotted hyena enclosure, before dropping unidentified objects down to two of the animals. The Taipei Zoo in a statement said the man’s actions were “extremely inappropriate and even illegal.” In addition to monitoring the hyenas’ health, the zoo would collect evidence provided by the public
A decision to describe a Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement on Singapore’s Taiwan policy as “erroneous” was made because the city-state has its own “one China policy” and has not followed Beijing’s “one China principle,” Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Tien Chung-kwang (田中光) said yesterday. It has been a longstanding practice for the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to speak on other countries’ behalf concerning Taiwan, Tien said. The latest example was a statement issued by the PRC after a meeting between Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財) and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on the sidelines of the APEC summit
‘SIGN OF DANGER’: Beijing has never directly named Taiwanese leaders before, so China is saying that its actions are aimed at the DPP, a foundation official said National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) yesterday accused Beijing of spreading propaganda, saying that Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) had singled out President William Lai (賴清德) in his meeting with US President Joe Biden when talking about those whose “true nature” seek Taiwanese independence. The Biden-Xi meeting took place on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Peru on Saturday. “If the US cares about maintaining peace across the Taiwan Strait, it is crucial that it sees clearly the true nature of Lai and the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in seeking Taiwanese independence, handles the Taiwan question with extra
RSS