A Kaohsiung man faces a fine of up to NT$500,000 (US$15,809) for allegedly running an illegal transnational matchmaking business advertising Vietnamese brides, the National Immigration Agency said on Tuesday.
The agency said that members of its Kaohsiung City Brigade during an online sweep discovered a post on social media showing a placard written in Mandarin advertising a service to help local men find Vietnamese brides.
A school teacher in the city’s Linyuan District (林園) last month posted the picture, writing that she saw the ad near the school, the brigade said.
Photo copied by Liu Ching-ho, Taipei Times
“It’s hard to imagine that in the present time in 2023, we still have to see ‘Vietnamese bride’ ads,” the teacher wrote in the post.
The immigration affairs brigade said that as soon as it discovered the post, it dispatched investigators to where the placard was seen, a store opposite Linyuan Senior High School.
Investigators found that the owner of the matchmaking business was a man surnamed Lu (呂), who told an investigator over the telephone that he could provide 10 Vietnamese women to choose from, having mistaken him as someone looking for a foreign wife.
Everything Lu said during that call became evidence proving his involvement in the matchmaking service, the brigade said.
When later officially questioned, Lu said that his ex-wife, who is Vietnamese, suggested he launch a matchmaking business between Taiwan and Vietnam to make extra income.
Lu said that because he was not familiar with advertising online, he placed the sign with pictures of foreign women in front of a shop opposite the school.
By disseminating illegal advertisements related to transnational marriage, Lu contravened Article 58 of the Immigration Act (入出國及移民法) and faces a fine of NT$100,000 to NT$500,000.
Chao Chih-cheng (趙志成), head of the Kaohsiung City Brigade, urged the public not to trust such advertisements, whether found on the street or online.
He said that there are 35 approved transnational matchmaking business groups in Taiwan, all of which are listed on the immigration agency’s Web site.
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