Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislators Lai Jui-lung (賴瑞隆) and Puma Shen (沈伯洋) have proposed amendments to regulate lawmakers’ visits to China.
Legislators and elected representatives who have access to high-level classified materials should be included with military and intelligence personnel in facing restrictions when visiting China, to prevent leaks that could endanger national security, they said.
Lai proposed amending the Legislators’ Conduct Act (立法委員行為法) to require legislators who had attended closed-door meetings on national security matters to disclose their travel itineraries when visiting China, Hong Kong or Macau.
Photo: Lin Liang-sheng, Taipei Times
Shen seeks to amend the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (台灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例) to require legislators and other elected officials to obtain permission from a supervisory government agency before traveling to China.
“Our amendments are not to ban pan-blue camp legislators from visiting China. The important issue is that when they travel and hold talks with Chinese Communist Party officials, they should report back on those meetings,” Shen said.
“It should be their responsibility to report who they spoke with, their roles in China ... what was discussed. They should be required to inform the government” about the visits, he said.
The proposals were introduced last week, as the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers traveled to China.
Two ways to update the rules are to amend the law governing cross-strait relations or the National Intelligence Service Act (國家情報工作法), Shen said.
“Legislators have a duty to monitor the government. Therefore, they must alert the public to how dangerous it is when legislators visit China,” Lai said.
“We know that China is focused on stealing our national secrets, to obtain information on highly classified materials, but legislators must remain loyal to this country and keep these national secrets from leaking out,” he said.
“If we do not amend the laws to restrict this kind of travel, to require legislators exercise self-discipline, then China can gain easy access to military and national secrets through the legislature, which is the simplest and most direct channel for China,” he added.
“It is our sincere hope that the ruling party and opposition parties take up this stance to defend Taiwan’s military and national secrets, no matter which party is in charge of the executive branch,” Lai said.
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